UCLA Earns 3-0 Win Over Fullerton in NCAA Soccer

History wasn’t on the side of Cal State Fullerton soccer Coach Al Mistri Sunday, but it was definitely on his mind.

Mistri planned his strategy for Fullerton’s first-round NCAA Tournament game against UCLA knowing it had been 11 years since the Titans last beat the Bruins in soccer and 11 days since UCLA defeated Fullerton, 6-0, in a nonconference game.

Mistri hoped the Titans could conserve their energy by slowing the game in the first half and playing to a scoreless tie, and then go all-out in the second 45 minutes to create some breaks and a goal.

The second phase of Mistri’s plan worked fine. Fullerton applied heavy offensive pressure throughout the second half and created several excellent scoring opportunities.

Unfortunately, phase one hadn’t worked quite as well.

The defending national champion Bruins scored twice in the first 11 minutes to take control of the match and fought off the Titans in the second half on their way to a 3-0 victory in front of 1,003 fans on the UCLA campus.

UCLA improved to 16-0-5 and ran its unbeaten streak to 39 games, the longest in the nation. The Bruins will face Fresno State, a 1-0 winner over the University of San Francisco Sunday, in the Far West Regional Final. The date and site of the game will be announced today.

Although Fullerton (8-10-2) had its chances in the second half, the Titans couldn’t convert those opportunities into goals. They finally succumbed to the Bruins after UCLA forward Jeff Hooker scored his team’s third goal on a breakaway with 13 minutes remaining.

“They’re obviously a stronger team, so we tried to take away the first half,” Mistri said. “We can play with teams of this caliber, but only for about 45 minutes. I told (the players) that if it was 0-0 at halftime, we’d have about a 40% chance of winning.”

UCLA’s Peter Pelle took care of those percentages. He sent a header off Shaun Del Grande’s free kick past Titan goalie Bobby Ammann just 2:45 into the game to give the Bruins a 1-0 lead.

About eight minutes later, Lucas Martin, spoiling an attempted off-side trap by the Fullerton defense, took a pass from Paul Caligiuri in front of the penalty box, dribbled past Ammann and sent his shot into an open net for a 2-0 lead.

“They were trying to slow the game and take our steam out in the first half,” Bruin Coach Sigi Schmid said. “But the two early goals blew those tactics out of the water.”