G3: Quinnipiac 2, BC Men's Soccer 1

from my story in The Heights:

Two days after an emotional season-opening victory at Boston University, the Boston College men's soccer team suffered a letdown on Monday, losing 2-1 to the Quinnipiac Bobcats at the Newton Campus soccer field. It was a maddening afternoon for BC, who lost the game despite out shooting the Bobcats 31-6.

Quinnipiac stunned BC with two counter-attacking goals in the second half to erase a 1-0 halftime deficit. Junior forward for the Bobcats, Graciano Brito, had a goal and an assist to spark the rally. After the game, an emotional Brito expressed how much the win meant to the Bobcats.

"My freshman year I came here and we lost 2-0, my sophomore year we lost to them 4-1 at home … and this year, we finally beat them," Brito said.

BC coach Ed Kelly was frustrated by his team's poor finishing. "We should have scored five goals in the first 10 minutes," Kelly said. "We were killing them. We missed goal after goal after goal, and eventually, it's going to happen - you control the ball for the entire game, then you have two miscommunications in the back and you lose."

The game started off well enough for the Eagles, who out shot Quinnipiac 16-2 in the first half. BC broke through with a goal at 42:26 when Paul Gerstenberger hit a low free kick along the ground from 25 yards out that snaked around the Quinnipiac wall and snuck into the bottom right corner of the net, just out of the reach of a diving Frederick Hall.

Three minutes into the second half, freshman Karl Reddick hit a long smash from right of the goal that appeared destined for the back of the net, but Hall dove to knock it away, giving BC a corner kick. The Bobcats quickly cleared the ensuing corner to keep it a one-goal game.

That play would later be pivotal; 11 minutes afterward, at 58:36 of the game, Quinnipiac defender Ryan Smith lobbed a high, bouncing ball from behind the halfway line that was gathered by Brito in between two BC defenders at the top of the box. Goalkeeper Chris Brown came off his line to challenge Brito, who chipped the ball over Brown's head and into the back of the net to tie the game.

In the 67th minute, BC's Aidan Buick smashed a left-footed shot that was knocked out of bounds for a corner kick. Quinnipiac took control off of the corner and launched a swift counter-attack up the right wing. Nick Pelicaen delivered a ball to Brito, who was able to get clear of BC's defenders and run in on goal uncontested. He ripped a low, hard shot that was parried to the right by Brown, but Pelicaen was there to knock home the rebound and give Quinnipiac the 2-1 lead.