Recap: No. 1 Stanford Men’s Soccer shuts out Pittsburgh at Cagan
On Saturday, No. 1 Stanford men’s soccer defeated Pittsburgh at Cagan Stadium by a final score of 2-0. Stanford redshirt junior defender Palmer Bank scored for the Cardinal at 49:48 while redshirt sophomore midfielder Trevor Islam scored at 74:04. Redshirt junior Rowan Schnebly was the winning goalkeeper for the Cardinal, playing all 90 minutes with one save to go along with the shut out. Jack Moxom was the losing goalkeeper for the Panthers, recording five saves while giving up two goals in 90 minutes of action. Stanford improves to 11-1-1 overall and 5-1 in the ACC while Pittsburgh falls to 4-6-2 overall and 0-4-1 in the ACC. Stanford has now won eight matches in a row at home and with 15 points is atop the ACC standings.
BOX SCORE: Pittsburgh at Stanford-Saturday, October 11th
“Great performance, great result,” Stanford head coach Jeremy Gunn said after the match. “Pitt per a fantastic soccer team that can pass and move the ball so well and they make life really difficult for a team pressing them. And in the first half, I think we were, we were just giving away so many cheap fouls that when we were pressing them, we weren’t getting any reward for it because we were giving away a foul when we were maybe getting them into trouble. And so, second half, I think we were much better with our defensive work, where we would put them under pressure and then we’d win the ball and go and as you can see, we score a great goal from a turnover, transitional moment.”
Neither team would score in the first half as it remained tied 0-0 at halftime. At the same time, Stanford outshot Pittsburgh 5-0 while also having a 2-0 edge in corner kicks (7:28 & 21:57). The Cardinal definitely had the advantage. They just needed to find a way to get on the scoreboard.
“Yeah, I mean we pride ourselves on our fitness,” Islam said. “We run constantly in training, so we knew that we could outlast them. So we just tried to empty the tank in the first half, outrun them, wait for them to get tired, and we knew that we’d ultimately get some goals.”
In the second half, Stanford would get off to a nice start with a corner kick at 46:07. Not long thereafter, Stanford would get on the scoreboard at 49:48 as Palmer Bank found the bottom right of the goal off his right foot thanks to an assist from Trevor Islam. That made it a 1-0 lead for the Cardinal.
“Yeah, that was another one. Not my best cross to be honest,” Islam said of his assist. “But I gave Palmer the chance to do something spectacular and he did. So, we were talking about what celebration he was going to do when he scored and he went over and strummed the guitar on the corner flag just like he said.”
“He’s doing everything right,” Gunn said of Islam. “His work rate is amazing. He’s so sharp and so strong and so difficult to play against. He makes 50-50 situations into his ball, he holds the ball up so well, he’s linking well, and of course he’s really looking to attack and he’s desperate to score, you know, even when we had one counterattack, he maybe could have slipped Fletcher and I love a striker who wants to shoot, you know? And so, no, he’s been amazing and it’s his moment right now and what we need to do is keep having everybody keep pushing. Another day won’t be his moment, it’ll be somebody else’s. So, let’s keep cashing in on great performances by people on the pitch.”
Stanford would then get corner kicks at 50:06, 57:52, and 58:40 as they continued to put pressure on Pittsburgh. Stanford would later get a corner kick at 72:57, but that would lead to a foul against Alfonso Tenconi-Gradillas, resulting in a free kick for Pittsburgh. Stanford would quickly respond though as Trevor Islam scored at the 74:04 mark, finding the bottom right of the goal off his right foot. Fletcher Bank would get the assist.
“You know, Trevor’s goal was a wonderful piece of soccer from us winning the ball, from them trying to build,” Gunn said. “And so, I thought that was the frustration in the first half, where we just didn’t really get going. They were passing, they were building. Sometimes we were fouling and we weren’t playing our best soccer on the ball. And so there was a little bit of frustration in the first half. But then second half, I think we had a really complete half where we were good both sides of the ball. We started playing a little bit more composed on the ball, we connected more passes, we moved the ball crisper, and we defended better as a unit. And so you know, when we say we’re frustrated in the first half, we were still keeping a good team scoreless, almost shotless, you know?
“And then obviously the second half, we showed our strength, we showed how strong we are mentally and physically and that we continue to turn the screws and turn the screws and you know, the longer we went on in the second half, there was clearly wanting in this tendency, which was exciting.”
“Yeah, a little tough for me to remember it,” Islam said of his goal. “Everything happened so fast, but amazing pass by Shane. We like to win and go. Win the ball, go forward, and score. And then Fletcher squared it to me and it was an easy tap in. So all credit to the other guys.”
From then on, the match would get progressively more chippy as a red card was issued against Pittsburgh’s Tomas Bedouret for violent conduct at 79:44. He stepped on a player’s chest who was down on the ground. That resulted in Bedouret getting ejected from the match. Pittsburgh didn’t like the call, but it upon review it was pretty clear what happened.
Stanford would then get a couple more corner kicks at 79:50 and 83:54, though neither led to a goal. 2-0 Stanford won as they outshot Pittsburgh 14-1 while also having a 9-0 advantage in corner kicks.
“I think two things,” Gunn said of the success in not allowing any corner kicks. “I think we defended very well. We defended well high, because they make some very good attacking runs. But also, they pass the ball in front of you and so they’re not threatening in behind from deep. They’re threatening in behind from a long distance away with through balls when we press. So, when they’re in the final third, they’re not really, they just weren’t able to penetrate too much. And they had a couple of, I think they had one good look in the first half and then a couple of good looks in the second half after we scored. That’s a little bit of a mental lapse from us and good play from them.
“No, I mean bottom line, our back four has been amazing. And I think sometimes the back four has been really, really well protected. And tonight, we weren’t quite protecting them quite as well, because we weren’t quite getting as much pressure on the ball and then when we sorted that out in the second half, I thought we looked really really good, you know?”
Ironically, even though Pittsburgh had the red card, Stanford actually committed more fouls 19-6, so it’s not like they weren’t playing physical. They were actually the more physical team. They just didn’t do anything super dirty like Pittsburgh did.
“Yeah, I mean, I think being front footed defenders,” Stanford senior defender Will Cleary said of the key to their defensive success. “So we wanted to press them and that kept the ball in their half. So even if they broke us, they still had 50 yards to get to goals. So that was really helpful. It was, not just the back, the back four had a great game, dominant winning balls in the air, cleaning up after one another, but the front six did a great job of pressing and getting into them so that they didn’t get happy and get chances on goal. Yeah, if we were to sit back, then you would have seen a lot more shots, a lot more chances.”
For Stanford, this is a good win. They could have allowed this match to be close after a 0-0 tie at halftime, but instead they kept trusting the process and in the end got rewarded with a multi-goal victory while also securing the shut out. It really doesn’t get much better than that.
“Yeah, I mean it was a great team win,” Cleary said. “I thought we were on the front foot the whole game. Really pressing them back. Most of the game was played in their half and that’s what we like to do. That was the game plan, so we executed well.
“In the first half, not everything was coming off for us the way we would have wanted to, but we kept pushing and ended up being able to put two in the back of the net in the second. So really really happy with our team performance and just excited to move forward. We get a little break now to reset, get to training hard again and then get up again on the 22nd against USF.”
As an added bonus for Stanford, all their remaining matches are in the Bay Area as they only have one road match left at Cal on Halloween. The combination of a bye week along with no more East Coast travel really helps to set up a chance to finish the season strong.
“And now we finally get to regroup,” Gunn said. “We get a little bit of a breather where we can really bring everybody along and so hopefully, when we come out of this little bye weekend, we can have lots of people knocking on the door, lots of people really pushing for those minutes, and to be the man.
“No, it’s exciting and it’s, you know, it just means we get to catch our breath and I love getting on road trips because you’re together and so I’m okay going on road trips, but also it’s fun to be home and the players like to be home, you know? And so, what we do, it just means we can get a little bit more rest. It means we can get a little bit more training in and it means we can continue to keep striving to get better, which is exciting.”
Up next for Stanford is a home match against San Francisco on Wednesday, October 22nd. That will begin at 6:00 PM PT on ACCNX.
“Yeah, it’s awesome. I mean, Cagan is our fortress,” Islam said. “We like to say no one comes to Cagan and leaves happy. So we’re making sure the opponents have a terrible time playing us each game and yeah, we just want to keep winning here.”
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