Boxscore
The University of Evansville men's soccer team is a veteran bunch, and four of the upperclassmen proved to be the difference Monday night in UE's 2-1 exhibition victory at McCutchan Stadium over the University of Cincinnati Bearcats.
Senior Mike Luttrull put Evansville ahead 1-0 at 29:10 after junior defender Justin Sass and senior forward Tom Irvin strung together passes that found Luttrull open just inside the penalty area. His shot sailed past Cincinnati keeper Joey Barnard for the first tally of the match. It remained a one-goal contest until 76:23, when Irvin made his second assist of the night, this time to junior Tad Kreamalmeyer, whose blast from 20 yards hit off the inside post and ricocheted just inside the far post to give the Aces a 2-0 lead.
The Bearcats finally struck at 82:54 when UE goalkeeper Phil Boerger was carded for taking down a Cincinnati player in front of the goal. Branden Stelmak took the penalty kick, and the shot went untouched to Boerger's right. Evansville's defense withstood several Cincinnati opportunities, and the UE offense helped out by controlling the ball in the final minutes to preserve the victory in front of a crowd of 921.
Both teams finished with 13 shots, with Cincinnati putting nine on goal against Boerger and the Aces hitting the mark six times against Barnard.\
“I was disappointed in the fact that our performance tonight was the worst we have had so far in pre-season," Jacobs said. "We really lacked composure in possession, and didn’t deal with adversity well during the match. As a positive, even when we didn’t play at our best, we were still able to grind out a result against a very good Cincinnati team. Good teams find ways to win, even when they don’t play at their best . Our hope is that matches like this help us get closer to becoming a good team.
“We had two outstanding goals from Mike Luttrull and Tad Kreamalmeyer, which helped us gain momentum. Luttrull’s goal came off a great combination with Tom Irvin playing him in behind Cincinnati’s defense. Kreamalmeyer’s goal was an absolute cracker – a blast from 18-yards out that put the game out of reach.”
Now 1-0-1 in the exhibition season, the Aces play their final friendly on Saturday against the University of Michigan at Ft. Wayne, Ind. Kickoff is at 6:10 CDT.
