Nov. 18, 2007

Box Score

FARMVILLE, VA - In dramatic fashion, the Florida Atlantic University men's soccer team won its conference tournament for the first time ever, defeating Longwood in a penalty kick tiebreaker on Sunday.

The match was a defensive struggle as the two teams combined for just four shots in the first half. Longwood struck first when Max Greissbach put a Marcus Dixon rebound into the net in the 77th minute. FAU launched a furious rally in an attempt to tie the score. FAU's aggression led to four Owl yellow cards and a red card on junior forward Javier Carrillo.

The Owls' offensive attack bore fruit in the 89th minute when a Trey McEntee shot was put into the Longwood net by a Lancer defender to tie the score 1-1. Two overtime periods resulted in only one shot for each time and the teams moved on to the penalty kick tiebreaker.

Both teams made four of their five penalty kicks in the initial tiebreaker. The teams matched goals through two sets of additional penalty kick. FAU keeper Phillip Lamarre made a save of an Elvis Cosic shot to give Markus Karcher a chance to win the match on FAU's ninth penalty kick.

Karcher beat First Team All-ASC goalie Brandt Youmans to give the Owls the tiebreaker 8-7. The Atlantic Soccer Conference does not receive an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament, so the Owls must await the NCAA Selection Show to see if they will be one of the 64 teams invited to participate in the tournament. The NCAA Selection Show will air on Monday, November 19, at 5:30 on ESPNews.