Buffs See Season End in Heartbreaking Fashion – West Texas A&M University Athletics

CANYON, Texas – West Texas A&M men’s soccer saw its season come to an end in heartbreaking fashion as the Buffs fell to Dallas Baptist 3-2 in double overtime.  The Buffs end the season with a 6-7-5 overall record.
 
WT pushed the pace early, quickly entering DBU territory in the game’s opening minutes. The Buffs created the game’s first scoring chance when Rafa Javelera took a shot from deep. The WT defender’s shot froze Patriots’ goalkeeper Garrett McGee but just went wide of the back post. The Buffs continued to press the DBU back line, seeing multiple scoring chances blocked and cleared away. With WT looking to take an early lead, the Buffs forced their fifth corner of the game in the 21^st minute. On the corner kick, Matteo Landais curled his kick into the goal for a 1-0 lead. As the clock went under three minutes to play, the Buffs looked take the lead into halftime before DBU forced a corner of their own. The Patriots corner kick went to the back post where Blake Bauer headed the ball in to tie the game at one.
 
In the second half, WT continued its aggression in the opening minutes. Five minutes into the period, Gabriel Nevarez played a ball through to Philip Leano. Leano’s crossing pass took a slight deflection before Landais buried the ball in the goal. DBU answered the WT goal four minutes later when Evan Pustejovsky found Chase Turcotte for the equalizer. The Patriots stole momentum in the 61^st minute when a DBU player looked to score, but the offside flag went up, waving off the go-ahead goal. WT had a go-ahead goal of its own waved off in the 64^th when Quintin Benn-John’s shot appeared to cross the goal line, but a team save stopped the attempt. After an extended discussion, the officials ruled the Patriots cleared the ball cleanly. Following the chances, the intensity picked up with DBU seizing momentum once again.  Before either squad could find a game-winner, the clock ran out of time to send the game to overtime.
 
In the first overtime period, the pace of play slowed down drastically. Although the Buffs held a 5-1 advantage in shots, the teams went to a second overtime period. Two minutes into the second overtime, Chase Turcotte fired a shot where Luke Southerington pushed the attempt away. Before a WT player could clear the ball, Peyton Voelker cleaned up the rebound for the game-winning goal.