Firebirds Fight to Force 2-2 Tie at Daemen

AMHERST, NY – The University of the District of Columbia men's soccer team fought back from a 2-0 deficit to force a 2-2 double-overtime tie in the first ever meeting against East Coast Conference newcomer, Daemen on a cold and wet Saturday afternoon in Northwest NY.

The Firebirds move to 7-5-1 on the year overall and 2-4-1 in league play while the Wildcats are now 4-11-1 and 0-7-1 in league play.

Daemen, looking for its first ECC win as a member of the conference, scored late in the first half on a goal by Kyle Clifford. The Wildcats took a 1-0 lead into intermission. A little over 15 minutes into the second half, Alex Reid blasted a shot to the left corner of the net to make it 2-0 Daemen.

From that point on, it was all Firebirds. The visitors out-shot their hosts 14-7 in the second half (26-14 for the afternoon) as they went on to score two unanswered goals.

Sophomore Moussa Traore (Psychology – Silver Spring, MD/John F. Kennedy HS) put the Firebirds on the board in the 67^th minute when he scored off of an assist by senior Bakary Coulibaly (Electrical Engineering – Bamako, Mali/La Lumiere HS). The goal was Traore's second of the year.

The Firebirds would then tie the score with just over seven minutes left in regulation when Coulibaly headed in a cross by freshman Patrick Borchert (Business Management – Hagen, Germany/Hiedegardis Gymnasium) for his team-leading 8^th goal of the year.

Freshman Nenad Smiljanic (Business Administration – Barnsley, England/Barnsley College) was mere inches away from his third game-winner of the season with 34 seconds remaining in regulation, but his shot clanged off the post.

UDC out-shot Daemen 3-1 in the two overtime periods but neither team could score the golden goal to give the game a winner.

Next up, the Firebirds visit ECC foe Mercy on Tuesday, October 29^th at 2:30 p.m.