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With 198 teams in men’s Division I soccer, it’s not easy to garner a top 25 ranking. Brown University showed that they are indeed worthy of their no. 21 national ranking on Thursday as the Brown Bears knocked off the visiting UMaine Black Bears 2-1 in a hard-fought game. Maine jumped onto the scoreboard in the 22nd minute, as junior forward Dimitri Anastasiou collected goalkeeper Nemanja Kostic’s punt, and struck from about 20 yards out. The shot to the left of the diving Goalkeeper gave the Black Bears the lead at 1-0. Brown took the momentum heading into the locker room, however, as Brown forward Dylan Sheehan scored from the right side of the box with four seconds remaining in the half.
In the second half, the game remained in a 1-1 deadlock, as neither team could capitalize on their chances, until the 64th minute, when Brown freshman Jon Okafor headed a flip-throw past Kostic to give Brown the 2-1 advantage. That would prove to be all Brown needed, as neither team could get much of anything going for the remainder of the match.
Despite the loss, the Black Bears were able to take many positives from the match. Not the least of these was the fact that Maine had competed with and even taken a lead against one of the premier clubs in the nation. Anastasiou summed up the post-game mood “The team responded fairly well because we competed with one of the top teams in the nation, but at the same time you can’t be satisfied with the result.”
Maine falls to 1-4 as a result of the contest, and Brown continues their undefeated start at 3-0. The Black Bears’ schedule doesn’t get much easier, as they travel to Chestnut Hill, Mass. on Tuesday to take on Boston College, another of the nation’s elite clubs. However, B.C. will have their hands full with an energized Maine squad that will be confident coming off of their solid performance on Thursday.
“It shows that we can definitely play with quality teams,” Anastasiou said. The Black Bears will look to do more than just compete with Boston College. Maine hopes to correct the mental mistakes that have accounted for most of the goals against them this season, as well as to capitalize on more scoring chances than they did on Thursday. As Anastasiou said, “We want to come away with a victory, so that we can say that we beat a quality team, not just competed with them.” Maine returns home on Sunday, Sept. 23 to take on Long Island University.
Bangor Daily News