Men’s soccer wins fifth shutout game of season with victory over Oregon State
Senior midfielder Kike Poleo scored UCLA men’s soccer’s first and only goal against Oregon State on Sunday. He substituted into the match in the in the 29th minute and scored the game-winner in the 79th. (Liz Ketcham/Assistant Photo editor)
Men's soccer
| Oregon State | 0 |
| UCLA | 1 |
By Marcus Veal
Oct. 8, 2018 8:17 a.m.
Add one more to the Bruins’ shutout tally.
UCLA men’s soccer (7-4, 3-1 Pac-12) grabbed its second consecutive 1-0 win Sunday afternoon against Oregon State (5-4-2, 1-2).
Senior midfielder Kike Poleo scored the lone goal in the 79th minute. Poleo and freshman midfielder Matt Hundley had a give-and-go sequence in the box before Poleo’s shot struck the left post and in.
“(Coach Jorge Salcedo) is always telling me to take guys on, so I did that with Hundley,” Poleo said. “He was in an area where he scores a lot, so he pretended like he was going to shoot, which made the defenders step up and I was able to hit it to the left post.”
The Bruins put 21 shots up as a team against the Beavers, and eight of them were on goal. Two of the shots on target came from freshman midfielder Frankie Amaya.
The first was when he tried a first-touch shot off a low cross from redshirt senior midfielder Joab Santoyo, but Beaver goalkeeper Adrian Fernandez pushed it over the net for his first of seven saves on the day.
The next one was in the 59th minute after Amaya went past more than half of the team, only to send a chip shot right to Fernandez.
Five other Bruins put shots on goal, including sophomore forward Milan Iloski, who made his third consecutive start of the season. Iloski returned from injury just as junior forward Mohammed Kamara got hurt and left a hole in the starting 11.
Salcedo said he admired Iloski’s ability to come in and execute when his number is called.
“He’s goal-dangerous,” Salcedo said. “He created good moments for himself and his teammates. (Iloski) brings in intelligence, good thought process and a lot of positive aspects to his game and our game.”
Sunday’s game had a temperature of 76 degrees and took place only two and a half days after Thursday’s game.
“We had heavy legs from the game against Washington,” said redshirt junior defender Matthew Powell. “The heat wasn’t much of a factor, but we adjusted the way we played and were a little more patient today and attacked when we could.”
After four games of conference play, UCLA is sitting at 3-1 and is in a tie with No. 18 Stanford atop the Pac-12 rankings. Stanford topped Cal in a 4-2 win Sunday.
Freshman goalkeeper Justin Garces has been the starter in the four conference games after splitting duties with senior goalkeeper Cole Martinez in the nonconference portion of the schedule.
Garces has been the starting goalie in three of the five games in which UCLA shutout its opponent, including the back-to-back shutouts against Washington and Oregon State.
The Bruins’ next game is on the road against San Diego State on Saturday night at 7 p.m.
