RIPON, Wis. - The Rockford University men's soccer team dropped a hard-fought 3-2 match on the road Saturday afternoon at Ripon College. Although Rockford was outshot 21-7 in the match, Ripon only had a slight 9-5 edge in shots on goal. The Red Hawks scored the first three goals of the match before the Regents began to mount a ferocious comeback.
Rejhan Jakupi scored his first goal of the season on a penalty kick, and then
Jose Lane Mendoza knocked in his second goal of the year to cut the deficit down to just one. Unfortunately, the Regents did not have another shot on goal the remainder of the match and dropped their second straight meeting to the Red Hawks.
- The match was a defensive struggle for the majority of the first half, with the score remaining tied at zero after 37 minutes of play.
- The Regents had a pair of shots on goal from Jose Lane Mendoza and Rejhan Jakupi but came up empty both times.
- Unfortunately, the Red Hawks then found the back of the net twice in less than two minutes to take a 2-0 lead into the break.
- Ripon then took a commanding 3-0 lead following a goal less than two minutes into the second half.
- Rockford was finally able to break through with a penalty kick goal in the 50th minute by Rejhan Jakupi to make it a 3-1 game.
- The score remained unchanged until the 82nd minute when Jose Lane Mendoza found the back of the net to pull Rockford back to within one at 3-2.
- Unfortunately, the Regents got off just one shot the remainder of the match, which sailed wide left of the target, and thus fell by a final score of 3-2.
