PETRONE TOO MUCH AS RAMS FALL TO SETON HALL, 4-1
Sekyere picks up fourth assist in four games
Box Score

RICHMOND, Va. – For much of Sunday’s championship game, it was a battle of defenses as the Virginia Commonwealth University men’s soccer team was locked in a 1-1 tie with Seton Hall. It quickly turned into the Sam Petrone show as the sophomore scored three straight goals for the Pirates to defeat the Rams 4-1 in the championship game of the 2008 Nike/Alltel Classic.

With the loss, the Black and Gold fall to 1-3 on the season, while Seton Hall improves to a perfect 4-0.

The first half was a defensive battle throughout with not many scoring chances for either squad and only 14 shots total in the first 45 minutes.

VCU’s best offensive chance in the first half came when Ole Laabs (Bremen, Germany) nearly hooked up with fellow German Jorit Loehr (Bremen, Germany) in the 21st minute as the freshman controlled a loose ball and sent a beautiful feed across the box to Loehr, who blasted a shot from within 10 yards, but Pirate goalkeeper Sean Carr was able to knock it down to keep the game scoreless.

Head Coach Tim O’Sullivan’s halftime speech must have worked as the Rams came out firing as Loehr nearly had his third goal of the weekend in the 48th minute, but Carr came up with a save, but the rebound was left right on the doorstep. Sophomore C.J. Gehin-Scott (Chesapeake, Va.) came rushing in to pick up the rebound, but his shot went just left of the net.

The Black and Gold tested Carr again two minutes later as junior Owusu Sekyere (Suame-Kumasi, Ghana) sent a beautiful back heel pass to Gehin-Scott, who sent a laser from 10 yards out, but again the Seton Hall keeper kept the game scoreless.

Sekyere helped the Rams take the lead in the 54th minute as he sent a beautiful cross pass to Loehr, who sent a back heel pass to a cutting Gehin-Scott. Gehin-Scott blasted a shot past a diving Carr to give VCU a 1-0 advantage.

Petrone would help even the score in the 67th minute as he dribbled down the left sideline and found a streaking Andrew Welker, who rifled a shot from 25 yards out past a drawn out Andrew Dykstra (Woodbridge, Va.) to tie the score at 1-1.

Petrone’s speed would haunt VCU’s defense the rest of the game as he got back-to-back one-on-one with Dykstra to score two goals within 24 seconds to give Seton Hall a 3-1 lead.

The hat trick goal would come in the 84th minute as Petrone got a feed from Brayan Martinez and beat Dykstra from the left side of the box to push the Pirates advantage to 4-1.

VCU’s offense was unable to get anything going in the final six minutes as Seton Hall picked up the 2008 Nike/Alltel Championship with a 4-1 victory.

The two teams were even in the shots category at 16-16 with the Pirates holding a 7-6 advantage in the shots on goal column.

Sekyere now leads the squad with four assists on the young 2008 campaign, while Gehin-Scott notched his third career goal.

Loehr, Sekyere and senior captain Dirk Dittrich (Stuttgart, Germany) were honored for their outstanding play over the weekend with a spot on the All-Tournament Team.

The Rams are back in action next Saturday evening as they host the nationally-ranked Cavaliers of the University of Virginia in a 7 p.m. contest.