Coker vs UNG Ends All Square in a 3-3 Thriller

DAHLONEGA, GA: The Cobras traveled to Dahlonega, GA, to open their season against the University of North Georgia. This game brought everything you would ever want as a Soccer fan, with early goals and late drama to keep you on the edge of your seat.

BY THE NUMBERS:

• Final Score
  • Coker 3
  • North Georgia 3
• Records
  • Coker 0-0-1 (0-0)
  • North Georgia 0-0-1 (0-0)

TOP PERFORMERS:

• Alvaro Bonet
  • 1 goal
• Christian Johnson
  • 1 goal
• Yonatan Cohen
  • 1 goal
• Mouhamadou Savane
  • 1 assist

HOW IT HAPPENED:

1st Half

• The Cobras come out of the gate hot in this game. The Cobras were putting a lot of pressure on the backline of North Georgia when the breakthrough finally came in the 4th minute of play.
• After the first attempt on goal by Yonatan Cohen was blocked. Florian Senst collected the ball at the top of the 18 before unleashing a blistering volley towards the left side of the goal. The North Georgia Keeper made a diving save that was parried right into the path of Christian Johnson, who buried the ball into the back of the net to give the Cobras an early lead in this game.
• Then, in the 12th minute of the Game, North Georgia was able to claw a goal back after the referee gave UNG a penalty kick after a Florian Senst challenge in the box.
• Not a minute later, the Cobras retook the lead with a goal from Yonatan Cohen. On the very first attack of the restart of the match, Mouhamadou Savane deceived his defender with a beautiful through ball into the path of Yonatan Cohen, where he shot his ball high into the roof of the net, beating the UNG Keeper at the near post from point-blank range.
• But just when this game couldn't get any more exciting, the Cobras gave up another penalty kick 1 minute after they took the lead. Alvaro Bonet was attempting to clear the ball when he just clipped the UNG attacker, leading the referee to award another penalty that Vukasin Lukovic scored.
• The goal scoring died down after an exciting opening 15 minutes, as neither team was able to find the back of the net in the second half.

2nd Half

• Much like the first half, Coker came out to start the second half on fire offensively. If it wasn't for a spectacular triple save from the UNG keeper in the 53rd minute, the Cobras would've taken another early lead to start the second half.
• The game came to a bit of a lull over the next 10 minutes until a wonder strike out of nowhere from Alvaro Bonet. Making up for his mistake leading to the 2nd UNG goal. Bonet collected the ball after he tackled a UNG midfielder. Once he had control of the ball, he sent an absolute missile into the top right corner of the net from 35 yards out to give the Cobras a 3-2 lead with 25 minutes left to play.
• With 4 minutes left to play, UNG was awarded a corner kick. UNG crowded the keeper for this corner delivery, where Carter Nunnery was blocked from seeing the ball coming towards the net as UNG scored an olympico to tie the game in the dying moments of the game.

QUOTE FROM THE COACH:

Obviously disappointed to not walk away with a win. However, we are very proud of our warriors for coming together in such a short time. Me and the coaching staff are very pleased with what we saw from the boys tonight. We have a lot to build on, and we are excited for the opportunity to be able to come together more and to compete with the best in our upcoming season. It's time to rest up and hopefully come out with the 3 points on Sunday at Young Harris.

WHAT'S NEXT?

Coker will play next on September 7th as they take on Young Harris on the road to finish out their Georgia Road Trip. You can tune into this game on the Conference Carolinas Network or with the live stats on the Coker Cobras Men's Soccer Page.