The State - 9.13.14 CONWAY --- After knocking off two ranked opponents on the road during a challenging opening three-game stretch, the Coastal Carolina men's soccer team finally made its home debut Friday night.
But it didn't go nearly according to plan for the Chanticleers.
The No. 13-ranked Chants had a first-half goal waived off the scoreboard after a protest from Furman's coach, and the Paladins later struck in the 76th minute for the lone goal in a 1-0 win on a wet and rainy evening.
"I just think we've got to be better in a lot of areas," Coastal Carolina coach Shaun Docking said. "I thought Furman were very well organized tonight, very well coached and battled incredibly hard. They were very good on the counter attack, and they deserved to win tonight. I thought they had more passion about how they wanted to play, so I think there's a lot of things we can take from what they did tonight and try to bring that into our game."
Freshman forward Lewis Hawke notched the game-winner for Furman (4-1), scoring his team-leading fourth goal of the season after getting a clean feed in front of the net from midfielder Marco Ortiz, who initially corralled a ball into the box from midfielder Hart Zwing. Junior goalkeeper Devin Cook-Perales was frustrated after the game that Hawke had that much freedom in the box, but the Chants' problems were plenty Friday night.
Their real undoing was an inability to finish chances as the outshot Furman, 26-7, in the loss. Paladins goalkeeper Sven Lissek made seven saves in the shutout, and the Chants (2-2) had a number of other close calls narrowly miss.
"We overhit balls tonight, the runs weren't crisp into the box, the finishing and shooting wasn't where it needs to be so overall we just need to be better in that area," Docking said.
Then there was the overturned goal ...
In the 16th minute, senior defender Uchenna Uzo looked to have scored the first goal of the game as the Chants took a free kick just outside the 18-yard box, but Furman coach Doug Allison argued that because the trainer had been called onto the field after Uzo went down on the play resulting in that free kick, he was required to leave the field and thus not eligible to be part of that goal.
"I don't really understand why the referee called the goal back, but he did," Docking said. "The refereeing wasn't an issue tonight. It was what we did and how we contributed to how we played, and playing against a good Furman team you've got to do a lot of things right to win. It's a disappointing loss, and we've just got to take a lot of things from this game and get better."
Coastal Carolina had made a strong early impression on the road with wins at Connecticut, ranked No. 8 in the NSCAA poll at the time, and against a Charlotte team ranked in one of the other polls. After their 2-1 start, with the lone loss at then-No. 2 Maryland, the Chants entered the week ranked anywhere from No. 8-13 in various national polls.
Friday night provided a wake-up call of sorts, though, and they'll look to regroup before hosting No. 17 South Carolina on Tuesday.
"It's disappointing," Cook-Perales said. "We had a lot of quality opportunities that we didn't capitalize on, and honestly we beat ourselves tonight. One mental lapse in the back --- they cross the ball, a flick in --- that can't happen, especially late in the game when we've been pressing the whole time. You know, 20 shots, we have to finish one. So tomorrow we've definitely got to get to work. ...
"It's very disappointing, but we've got to keep grinding because it's just the beginning of the season."
