Georgia Southern men’s soccer was handed their first loss of the season by Florida Gulf Coast Friday night. FGCU shut out the Eagles 2-0 while putting away a goal in the first and second half.

The game was won and lost in both penalty boxes,” GS Head Coach John Murphy said. “I thought we started brightly, we created some good chances from our pressure, which I thought was quite good.”

Georgia Southern didn’t give up though—shooting shot after shot and trying to find the back of the net whenever they had the chance. Although they were unsuccessful, the Eagles did outnumber FGCU in shots 17-7 while corner kicks were 4-4.

“In the second half, now we’re pushing on, looking for the equalizer and we’re vulnerable,” Murphy said. “They go and score the second. They’re built for it, I think they’re very well coached. and it was a very good performance from them.”

The game was aggressive, especially towards the end as the Eagles were fighting harder for a goal. Four yellow cards were handed out in the game, two to FGCU and two to GS.

Defensively the Eagles were solid, but had a few slipups. While GS did a good job of keeping the ball out of their defensive goal box for the most part, they struggled a bit to keep possession once the ball and FGCU was no longer a potential threat to scoring.

Freshman Goalkeeper Jokull Blaengsson had two big saves in the first half in attempts to keep a shutout on his side, but it was not enough as FGCU shut out the Eagles and gave GS their first loss.

The Eagles have just four days to regroup and prepare themselves for when they face off against top ranked Wake Forest Tuesday, Sept. 11 in Winston Salem.

Kaitlin Sells, The George-Anne Assistant Sports Editor, gasports@georgiasouthern.edu