Dominant Defense Elevates Men’s Soccer to Shutout Victory over Iona

By: Andrew Selover | @AndrewSelover
CitrusTV Men’s Soccer Beat Reporter

The Syracuse Men’s Soccer team kicked off its 2022 campaign with a 2-0 win over Iona. In the first ever matchup between the Orange and the Gaels, SU dominated from the start. Syracuse only allowed 2 shots on goal, neither coming in the second half. Head Coach Ian McIntyre praised his back line for controlling the game all the way through.

“We’ve had some guys coming back from some injuries, so it was good to get some minutes from Buster (Sjoberg) and Amferny (Sinclair). It was nice to have some old heads in there. I thought, especially second half, we did a really good job of pressing the ball and stopping balls from going into their front guys. Our midfield did a wonderful job of picking up those knockdowns and then going to play. So yes, you talk about your goalkeeper, you talk about your back three, but I thought that the blocks in front of them did really well on a hot afternoon to really work and try to make the game as predictable as we could. You know Iona was always going to have moments, but I thought we did a good job to limit their time on the ball,” said Coach McIntyre.

Center-back Buster Sjoberg added, “I think as we play today, we had (Christian) Curti to the left, Abdi (Salim) on the right, and me in the middle. Then we have Amferny (Sinclair) sort of as a shield who can work to cover that space that occurs in between us, Geo, and Colin. I think he’s doing a very good job. Amferny is a very specific player. He is good at winning the ball, and he’s good at getting the ball out of those tight situations once he wins it. So yeah, I think [the defense] was good today.”

The task gets much more difficult for Syracuse when #21 Penn State comes here to the SU Soccer Stadium on Sunday. The Nittany Lions enter as reigning Big Ten champs. Kickoff is scheduled for 6 p.m.