Syracuse Men’s Soccer has No Answer to Clemson Attack in 7-4 Loss

By Nick Kuzma

CitrusTV Men’s Soccer Beat Reporter

In the 86th minute, Clemson’s Robbie Robinson found the back of the net to give the No. 8 Tigers (11-1-1, 4-1-1 Atlantic Coast) their seventh goal of the game. The score put Clemson up by three goals and ended any hope Syracuse had to complete a dramatic comeback.

“I think at the end of the day, you give credit to [Clemson],” said Syracuse Head Coach Ian McIntyre. “But we’ve had a bad night.”

Syracuse (5-4-4, 1-3-2 Atlantic Coast) just had no answer for the Tiger’s attack, who still somehow took fewer shots than the ‘Cuse. SU took 17 shots, 12 of which were on goal, and Clemson fired 15 shots, putting eight on goal.

Syracuse Goaltender Christian Miesch had just one save in an overall poor defensive performance.

“Christian is a great guy,” said SU Defenseman Sondre Norheim. “He knows he can evaluate himself, and right now, I don’t think people should go around and pointing fingers. This was the whole team’s doing.”

When asked what he plans on saying to his goaltender after the game, McIntyre’s answer was simple.

“Nothing. I’ve gotta watch the tape, but I don’t put any responsibility [on him],” the 10-year head coach said. “I don’t think he really made a big save, but I don’t think he really hurt us.”

The Cuse did score four goals and fought back from a 5-1 second-half deficit, but Syracuse did not want to look at this game in a positive light.

“It’s not so much taking positives because I think today we weren’t very good, but it’s more of just learning from what we didn’t do well.”

Despite his team coming up small in many areas, Coach McIntyre did not want to throw his team under the bus. The veteran coach took full responsibility for his team’s performance.

“I think I got the balance of [Clemson] wrong. I think our shape was wrong, and ultimately we didn’t help ourselves,” said McIntyre. “That’s on me because I didn’t do a good enough job preparing us for this Clemson team,” he later continued.

Allowing seven goals has severely hurt Syracuse’s stat rankings. The Orange are now dead last in the ACC for both goals allowed per game (1.92) and save percentage (57.6%).

After defeating Connecticut on Tuesday, Massimo Ferrin boldly said that he felt like the Orange were a great team that could win championships. Despite the blowout loss, the senior still has faith in his squad.

“A lot of great teams go through adversity,” he said. “I think it’s not ‘gonna slow us down anyway. It’s definitely a wakeup call to understand that you can’t take a night off, especially in the ACC, because teams will punish you.”

Earlier in the week, Syracuse announced that they would add an extra game to the schedule. The Orange will host Division III SUNY Morrisville (2-10-2, 1-6-1 North Eastern Athletic) on Tuesday.

Kickoff is scheduled for 4 o’clock at SU Soccer Stadium.

npkuzma@syr.edu | @nkuz71