The Geneseo men’s soccer team was picking up momentum at the right time as it defeated both St. John Fisher College and SUNY Potsdam on Oct. 29 and Saturday Nov. 1 respectively, but was unable to continue its success against SUNY Oneonta on Wednesday Nov. 5. The Knights thrashed Fisher 3-0. Head coach Dominic Oliveri was obviously pleased with the win, saying he was glad to see the Knights put up more than one goal in the win.
“I’m glad that we were able to give ourselves some room for error during the game,” Oliveri said. “We haven’t put up a multiple-goal win since the beginning of October. I was really pushing it on the guys for the week of Nov. 1.”
Oliveri also said that he was happy that the Knights have not only scored on set pieces, but also on the run of play.
“That’s something we worked on at practice,” he said. “All of our goals against Fisher were from the run of play. It was encouraging to see since that was what we wanted before starting the playoffs.”
The Knights continued to win as they rolled past Potsdam to launch them into the SUNYAC semifinals. Like their previous game against Fisher, the Knights tallied multiple goals to top the Bears 2-0. Oliveri said that he had expected the results, despite the team losing to Potsdam 1-0 on Oct. 25.
“We played a good game against them a week ago,” he said. “We came into this game confident that we’d come out with the win.”
The Knights blitzed the Bears with 21 shots—10 on goal. They were in high spirits as they looked forward to their showdown against undefeated SUNY Oneonta. Oliveri said that he really believed the team had a chance against the Red Dragons.
“We’re winning games at the right time of the year and I feel good about the game,” Oliveri said.
He also said an important tactic for the game was the defense.
“They are the number one defense in the conference and we are the second best defense,” Oliveri said. “Based on the way we’re playing right now, I think it’ll be a low-scoring game. In fact, I think we have it in us to win the whole thing.”
Oliveri’s prediction did not come true as Oneonta shut the Knights out 4-0. Junior midfielder Colin Volpe assisted on two of the goals for the Red Dragons. The Knights were outshot by Oneonta 13-5, with junior goalkeeper Logan Calvey making seven saves throughout the game.
The Knights finish their season with 11 wins and a semifinal playoff berth—a big improvement from last year where they did not even make it into the playoffs.
“The guys have done a great job all season and we’ve really bounced back from last year,” Oliveri said. “We were disappointed we didn’t make the playoffs last year, so I like where we are as a team now.”