Though the North Carolina men’s soccer team failed to defeat Coastal Carolina in its second exhibition game of the season, coach Carlos Somoano wasn’t concerned with the outcome.
The close game may have ended in a 1-1 tie, but Somoano was more focused on finding the perfect combination of players.
“I’m looking at combination of players, more focused on our team right now and I’m not really all that concerned where the territory was,” Somoano said. “I think that’s a very good team. It showed us a lot what we need to work on, and it gave us a lot to look forward to this week in terms of getting ready for next week.”
Freshmen Danny Garcia and Raby George earned spots in the starting 11 and remained on the pitch for the majority of the match. Though the freshmen are coming up to speed and meshing with the rest of the team, the physical prowess of Coastal Carolina’s players at times proved difficult to manage for UNC.
“We did okay, and they’re definitely more physically mature team than us,” Somoano said. “They’re a little bit older … That’s a good test for us to get our guys out there because they don’t really know what it’s all about or what they’re getting into yet in terms of facing top college teams like Coastal Carolina.”
Both teams remained scoreless at halftime, but Coastal Carolina outshot the Tar Heels in the first half. Senior goalkeeper Scott Goodwin attributed Coastal Carolina’s first half attack to UNC’s early defensive sluggishness.
“I think we started out not quite as intense as we needed to,” Goodwin said. “Our defensive intensity was lacking a little bit.”
After the break, the Tar Heels shook off the struggles from the first half and began aggressively attacking the goal. UNC’s newfound intensity paid off in the 68th minute as senior midfielder Martin Murphy capitalized on an out-of-position defender and buried the ball in the back of the net.
“I thought we had been working hard and playing well, so I thought we deserved a goal,” Murphy said.
But that wouldn’t be the end of the offensive action for the day. In the 77th minute, Coastal Carolina’s Ashton Bennett reminded the crowd of his explosive scoring ability and sent the ball past Goodwin on a free kick. Last season Bennett led the nation with 23 goals in 22 games.
Though UNC didn’t end its preseason on a high note, the Tar Heels will use this tie in their growing and maturing process.
“(In the second half) we started to put some things together and get that spirit back, and the play just took over from there and we made some good things happen,” Goodwin said. “Overall, I’m disappointed with the tie, but that’s our philosophy. We’ll grow from it.”
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