UCLA
UC Santa Barbara
UCLA Falls To UCSB, 2-0, In Front Of Record Crowd
September 24, 2010 | Men's Soccer
Sept. 24, 2010
For the second-straight week, UCLA played in front of a huge crowd in the central coast, falling 2-0 to UC Santa Barbara on Friday night in front of a Harder Stadium record 15,896. The crowd ranked as the second-largest ever to watch a regular season NCAA soccer game. The Bruins gave up a pair of late goals to drop their record to 4-2-1 on the year. UC Santa Barbara earned its third-straight shutout and improved to 3-2-2.
After a slow first half that saw UCLA and UCSB combine for just five shots (four by UCSB, one by UCLA), the two teams created more opportunities in the second half. Just one and a half minutes into the second half, Bruin freshman Kelyn Rowe had a shot that was saved by Sam Hayden, a theme that was repeated multiple times throughout the night. Rowe finished the match with five shots, all saved by Hayden. Matt Wiet was the only other Bruin to get a shot on goal, and that too was saved by the UCSB goalkeeper, who finished with six saves.
UCSB broke the scoreless tie at 74:05 when David Opoku collected a ball inside the box and fired past UCLA goalkeeper Brian Rowe for his third goal of the year. With UCLA trying to equalize, the Gauchos got a late insurance goal at 89:06 on a breakaway. Luis Silva passed to Danny Barrera, who beat Rowe one-on-one for the final tally of the night.
UCLA played in front of 8,717 last Friday at Cal Poly, which ranked as the 10th-largest regular season crowd in NCAA history at the time.
The Bruins continue weekend play on Sunday, Sept. 26 at Cal State Fullerton at 5 pm.
