Cortland's Nickolas Litzenberger getting ready to shoot the ball. (Ross Cohen/Cortland Voice).
Last night the Cortland Purple Tigers ended their match-up against East Syracuse Minoa with a breathtaking double overtime (1-1) tie.
The 5-2 record ESM team came into the game looking for an easy win after losing to Central Square by the minimum, but the Tigers never planned on making it easy for them.
With ESM taking control of the midfield throughout most of the first half, the Tigers first came into the game playing defensively, waiting for chances of a quick counter attack.
“Our defense is the rock of our team, so we can trust them,” said Cortland head coach Luke Schweider. “We started the game defensively to build our confidence. Once we started playing defense, knowing that we can do that, their confidence went up. They were solid and were communicating more than ever. It sounded like a college team out there communicating.”
During the first half Cortland only had one shot on target while ESM had nine. That was when Cortland’s goalkeeper, Cody Wilk came in to the rescue. With him having a total of six saves in the first half. Wilk finished the game with a total of nine saves, some of them being acrobatic saves.
Coming into the second half, the Tigers kept relying on the counter until senior forward, Nickolas Litzenberger scored the first goal of the game, giving the Tigers a (1-0) lead WITH 33:32 left in the second half.
Cortland Tigers celebrating a goal with fans. (Ross Cohen/Cortland Voice).
About ten minutes later, ESM’s Matthew Kenney, tied the game up (1-1) after getting an assist from Sean Belcher.
After that, the game began to get physical, especially in the midfield with both teams wanting to keep possession of the ball.
There were a total of 26 fouls throughout the game, with most of them coming off from the second half. Three of these fouls resulted in yellow cards. Two of them from ESM and one from Cortland.
“There were some questionable calls on both ends,” added coach Schweider. “We were sometimes on the receiving end and sometimes not. But it was just about keeping our composure and we talk about that all the time. When a game is going to get physical, it's going to get mental too.”
Both teams looked exhausted coming into double overtime, but that didn't stop the Tigers from trying to get that winning goal.
"The amount of adversity they had to overcome to get a tie from this game was incredible," said coach Schweider. "The fact that they were able to put about a hundred minutes in this game and finish strong, says a lot about their hearts and their character. That is huge going forward."
