PISCATAWAY, N.J. — Rutgers took 14 shots at Devin Armstrong on Friday night and put six of them on frame. Armstrong saved all six. Til Kauschke’s penalty in the 48th minute was the only goal Seton Hall needed, and the Pirates left Yurcak Field with a 1-0 win in front of 594 in the second match of Rutgers’ five-game homestand.
The finishing problem the Scarlet Knights appeared to solve against Sacred Heart came back in a different form. A week after missing the frame with 11 of 15 attempts, Rutgers
hit the target at nearly twice the rate and still didn’t score, running 11 second-half shots at a goalkeeper who turned the last 42 minutes into a wall. Francesco Di Ponzio led the attack with four shots and two on goal in 52 minutes off the bench. Rutgers falls to 1-2-1.
The goal came from a push in the back. Joshua Jerome was whistled at 47:49, Kauschke put the penalty inside the right post past Rafael Ponce de Leon, and a first half that had produced three shots a side turned into a siege. Ponce de Leon kept it a one-goal match a minute later with a sliding save at the edge of the box, finishing with four saves. Seton Hall improves to 2-1-1.
It got ugly before it got settled. The referee showed 10 yellow cards, seven to Seton Hall, and whistled 27 fouls. Two VAR reviews in the second half went against Rutgers, including a penalty check in the 82nd minute after Armstrong collided with a Scarlet Knight in the area. The chippy play eventually blew into a full blown shoving match after the final whistle.
Lineup
GK: Rafael Ponce de Leon
D: Simon Gorczowski, Devon Stopek, Nick Collins, Jeffrey Bryjak
M: Francesco Di Ponzio, Pius Ssebulime, Zach Mastrodimos, Amer Lukovic
F: Andrew Kitch, Dan Karsten
Subs: Thomas Angelone, Joshua Jerome, Erick Ruiz, Braxton Montgomery, Charlie Kitch, William Pierce, Abubakar Mayanja, Jude Essuman.
For the first time this season, McElderry didn’t change anything. The 4-4-2 that beat Sacred Heart came back intact, the same eleven in the same shape, after a September that had already produced a 5-3-2 at American, a switch to the 4-4-2 at Georgetown and one change from that XI in the home opener. Rutgers had scored four goals the last time these eleven started together. They didn’t score any this time.
What McElderry did instead was change five at once, twice. At 30:10, with the match scoreless and Rutgers having taken three shots, Angelone, Jerome, Pierce, Ruiz and Montgomery came on for Gorczowski, Mastrodimos, Andrew Kitch, Karsten and Di Ponzio, half the outfield in a single stoppage. Montgomery forced a save within a minute. At 55:48, trailing to the penalty, McElderry reversed most of it with Karsten, Gorczowski and Mastrodimos all came back on, with Charlie Kitch and Mayanja joining them and Bryjak coming off. Di Ponzio and Lukovic returned at 67:59, and Di Ponzio took four shots in his 22 minutes back, more than any Rutgers player managed all night. Only Ponce de Leon, Stopek, Collins and Ssebulime played 90 minutes.
Six Shots, and N0 Reward
The first half was even in the way that flatters neither side. Three shots each. Two saves each. Lejbowicz tested Ponce de Leon in the fifth minute and Lukovic tested Armstrong in the 12th, and both were the kind of attempt a goalkeeper handles standing still.
Rutgers had the better of the chances that weren’t shots. Jeffrey Bryjak dragged one off target in the 24th. In the 27th, the officials initiated a VAR review for a Rutgers penalty and waved it off, the first of three reviews that would go against the Scarlet Knights.
Then McElderry emptied half his team. At 30:10 Rutgers made five substitutions at once with Thomas Angelone, Joshua Jerome, William Pierce, Erick Ruiz and Braxton Montgomery came on for Gorczowski, Mastrodimos, Kitch, Karsten and Di Ponzio. Montgomery forced a save inside a minute. Seton Hall answered with three of its own at 32:47 and two more at 40:28, and by the interval both benches had been turned over almost entirely.
The half ended goalless with three corners for Seton Hall and two for Rutgers, and with 594 in the stands watching a match that had produced one shot on target apiece after the opening quarter-hour.
A Push in the Back, Then 40 Minutes Against a Wall
The second half was 169 seconds old when it turned. Joshua Jerome was penalized for a push from behind at 47:49, and Kauschke put the penalty inside the right post. Ponce de Leon guessed correctly on the wrong side of the ball.
It nearly became two a minute later. Ponce de Leon slid out to the edge of his area to smother a Seton Hall break, the save that kept the deficit at one and the match alive for the next 40 minutes.
Rutgers took 11 shots in the second half and Armstrong saved four of them, and the goalkeeping is the whole story of the night. Karsten struck from outside the area in the 64th and Armstrong tipped it over the bar. Three minutes after Rutgers had a slide-tackle challenge on Lukovic sent to review, a delay that produced a shouting match, a no-call and a Seton Hall throw-in at midfield. Simon Gorczowski forced another save and Lukovic put the follow-up wide. Seton Hall picked up a yellow card almost immediately after play resumed.
Brock Warren twice threatened to end it in the 78th, forcing a save and then missing the target. What followed was the sequence the crowd came for and didn’t get with three Rutgers shots in eight seconds, all blocked, then a handball against Seton Hall in the 82nd that brought a fourth official’s review of a collision between Armstrong and a Rutgers attacker in the area. No penalty. The cl0sest Rutgers came was with a free kick in the 85th minute that was narrowly tipped above the goal by Armstrong, seemingly sealing the fate of Rutgers.
Di Ponzio finished with four shots, two on target and neither past Armstrong. Rutgers won the shot count 14-9 and lost the only number that counts.
The discipline came apart alongside it. Ten yellow cards, seven to Seton Hall. Twenty-seven fouls. Four Rutgers offsides to Seton Hall’s none. Both sides picked up cautions at 89:44 for Charlie Kitch for Rutgers, Christensen for the Pirates, and the final whistle did nothing to cool it. I had the misfortunate of witnessing both teams get into a shoving match, showing that the emotions were not contained to the ninety minutes played.
The homestand runs three more matches: UC Santa Barbara on Sunday, defending Big Ten tournament champion UCLA for the conference opener on Sept. 11 and Princeton on Sept. 15.
Rutgers has now been shut out in two of four matches and has scored five goals, four of them in one night against a team that has since lost twice. The shooting is better than it was a week ago. The finishing isn’t. UCLA is a week away and won’t need 14 chances.
