Toreros Legg Out Victory : Soccer: Overtime goal gives USD a 3-2 triumph over Davidson and a berth in the NCAA title game against No. 1 Virginia.
The University of San Diego shut out the nation’s leading scorer on his home field, overcame a crucial mistake in the second half and advanced Friday to the NCAA Division I men’s soccer championship match with a 3-2 victory in overtime against Davidson.
The Toreros (19-4) will face defending national champion Virginia, a 3-0 winner over Duke (15-4-3) in Friday’s other semifinal match, in Sunday’s final at 10:30 a.m.
In front of 8,150 fans, with a vast majority of those pulling for the host Wildcats, USD’s Kevin Legg scored off a cross from Guillermo Jara with 2 minutes 36 seconds left in the second overtime period to give the Toreros the victory.
“Jara’s been coming through for us all season,” USD Coach Seamus McFadden said. “They were having trouble with our one touches and combinations all day, and that paid off for us in the end.”
It wasn’t the end, but rather the beginning where McFadden was most concerned.
Davidson (17-5-5), ranked 19th, got on the board in the first seven minutes when Ben Hayes took a cross from John Sampers and beat Torero goalkeeper Scott Garlick.
“That’s something I didn’t want them to do,” McFadden said. “That would get the crowd into it.”
The 13th-ranked Toreros held together, though, and got the tying goal at 37:30 when Chugger Adair scored on a header.
Adair’s goal, his 16th of the season, ended Davidson goalkeeper Alex Deegan’s streak of 367 minutes without allowing a goal.
“They scared us with that early goal,” McFadden said. “But it was great to see how we played our way back into it.”
USD used the momentum of the tying goal to go ahead only a minute later when Doug Barry collected a loose ball at midfield, dribbled toward goal and curved a shot past Deegan from 17 yards.
It was 2-1 USD at halftime, and the Toreros kept pressing, with Legg and Toby Taitano just missing early in the second half.
Then, said McFadden, “the unthinkable,” with 23:15 remaining.
USD defender Alex Streicek, looking to pass the ball back to Garlick, looked one way. Garlick went the other. The ball rolled toward the Torero goal, and Garlick wasn’t there.
“I think Alex was caught off guard, or he didn’t hear me because of the crowd,” Garlick said. “All I know is I sat there and watched it--freeze-frame--go into the goal.”
Said Streicek: “It was sort of defeating.”
It almost was. Davidson, with new life, assaulted the USD goal, and the game opened up.
Deegan made two spectacular saves in overtime on Adair and Jara, and Davidson’s Rob Ukrop, who leads the nation in scoring with 31 goals and 72 points, missed a point-blank shot, sending it over the crossbar.
Ukrop’s miss was one of only a few shots the senior could get off because of the defense of USD’s Scott Farley.
Farley, a sophomore from Milwaukee, marked Ukrop the entire match and forced the Wildcats to look for other ways to score.
“Ukrop is a good player. He’s big and strong and I was concerned coming into the match,” Farley said. “But it all worked out, I guess. He didn’t score.”
Ukrop, the biggest factor in Davidson’s selection into the tournament and rise to the Final Four, was impressed with Farley.
“I just couldn’t shake the guy,” Ukrop said. “He was on me all day and did a great job.”
On and on the chances came and went until the final two minutes of the second 30-minute overtime when Legg ended it.
Now the Toreros have the unenviable task of taking on the top-ranked Cavaliers (20-2-1).
Virginia, which could become the first team to repeat as champion since Indiana did it in 1982-83, has 11 current or former U.S. National Team members and three players who participated in the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona.
“They are loaded with talented players and they knock the ball around real well,” McFadden said of the Cavaliers. “But we don’t plan on doing anything differently for Virginia than we did with Davidson. We just need to play our game.”
Virginia Coach Bruce Arena realizes USD will pose quite a challenge.
“Obviously beating Davidson on their home field is a great accomplishment,” Arena said. “San Diego plays a wide-open style that usually ends in a lot of goals. I predict we’ll see quite a match on Sunday.”
