SPARTANBURG, S.C. – ETSU senior Joao Ramalho scored twice in the final 14 minutes, including the game-winner with 2:16 to play, as the Bucs topped Mercer 3-2 in Macon, Georgia, on Saturday in a winner-take-all match to clinch the Southern Conference regular-season title and the No. 1 seed in the upcoming SoCon Men’s Soccer Championship.
ETSU (11-4-2, 7-1-2 SoCon) entered the match trailing Mercer (12-6-0, 7-3-0 SoCon) by one point in the league standings, meaning the winner of the match would win the regular season. The Bears could also have claimed the title with a draw, but Ramalho rallied the Bucs from a late one-goal deficit to their first SoCon title.
The SoCon Championship begins with first-round matches on Saturday, Nov. 5, with No. 3 seed Wofford hosting No. 6 seed VMI at 6 p.m. and No. 4 seed UNCG hosting No. 5 seed Furman at 7 p.m.
Wofford (11-6-0, 6-4-0) topped VMI (0-16-0, 0-10-0) twice during the regular season, taking a 6-1 home win on Oct. 1 and a 1-0 road win on Tuesday. The teams have never met in the SoCon Championship. Wofford, which finished the regular season tied for third in the league standings with UNCG and split the season series with the Spartans, earned the No. 3 seed by virtue of its record against ETSU relative to UNCG’s record against the Bucs.
The Wofford/VMI winner will face No. 2 seed Mercer in the semifinals, which begin Thursday, Nov. 10, at UNCG Soccer Stadium in Greensboro, North Carolina. Mercer swept both opponents during the regular season. Of those potential opponents, the Bears, who joined the league in 2014, have only faced VMI in the SoCon tournament, picking up a 7-0 win in last year’s first round.
In the other first-round matchup, UNCG (10-6-2, 6-4-0) swept Furman (6-8-3, 2-6-2) during the regular season, taking a 1-0, double-overtime home win over the then-25th-ranked Paladins on Oct. 1 before completing the season sweep with a 3-2 road win on Oct. 18. That game also featured a dramatic finish, as the Spartans got a goal with 31 seconds left in regulation for the win.
The squads, who have combined to win 18 SoCon Championship titles, are familiar foes in the tournament, as they have met eight times, with Furman holding a 5-3-0 lead in the series.
The winner will advance to face top-seeded ETSU in the other semifinal. The Bucs played to a pair of scoreless draws against Furman and claimed a pair of one-goal wins over UNCG, including a 4-3, double-overtime victory on Oct. 8 in which Fletcher Ekern notched the first hat trick in program history.
The championship match will take place Saturday, Nov. 12, at 5 p.m. and will be broadcast live on ESPN3.
The tournament winner earns the league’s automatic bid to the NCAA Men’s Soccer Championship.
2016 SoCon Men’s Soccer Championship
Quarterfinal Round, Saturday, Nov. 5
Campus sites (at higher seeds)
Match 1: No. 5 Furman at No. 4 UNCG, 7 p.m.
Match 2: No. 6 VMI at No. 3 Wofford, 6 p.m.
Semifinals, Thursday, Nov. 10
Greensboro, N.C.
Match 3: No. 1 ETSU vs. Match 1 winner, 3:30 p.m. (SDN)
Match 4: No. 2 Mercer vs. Match 2 winner, 6 p.m. (SDN)
Championship, Saturday, Nov. 12
Greensboro, N.C.
Match 5: Match 3 winner vs. Match 4 winner, 5 p.m. (ESPN3)
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