Photos by Trinity Gesamondo
MORE — Buy tickets for Saturday’s home doubleheader
FC Buffalo took a gorgeous Saturday at Coyer Field and turned it into a dream doubleheader with 4-2 wins over the Cleveland Force in USL W League and USL League Two play.
The day started with a bang as Coach Mike Idland’s women built a 2-1 halftime lead and replicated their output in the second half.
Eileen Solomon set up Izzy Schmidt for an early goal before Erin Weir cleaned up a loose ball in the box before halftime, then Ava Plezia struck twice in the second — once off a KK Panella assist — to complete the four-goal day and give the women a second-straight home win.
Next up were the men, who wasted little time in putting Cleveland under pressure. The breakthrough came in the 20th minute when Ali Alomari won a 1v1 on the left side and dribbled across the heart of Cleveland’s third to find Ashton Jell. The captain showed the keeper a shot but cut a pass back through the 18 for Lucas Soares, who slotted home for his fourth goal of the season.
Cleveland leveled the score but found themselves behind before the break as Alomari bagged yet another goal — his sixth of the season — to make it 2-1 into halftime.
Lovro Kostanjsek stayed hot when he cut between two defenders early in the second half and was hauled down in the box. The Slovenian beat the keeper with his first penalty but had to retake it and went the same way for his fifth goal of the season (to go with four assists).
Cleveland fought back to make it 3-2 and had five minutes’ stoppage time to make things uneasy. They wound up getting 10 minutes, but Matheus Spina potted an Owen Sweeney set-up to give the men a matching final score to the women.
Another doubleheader — two games for the price of one — is on tap for the weekend, as the women will look for a season sweep of Erie and the men look to keep up their division title chase against a Pittsburgh Riverhounds 2 team that drew us 0-0 in Pennsylvania at Highmark Stadium. The women kick off at 4, with the men set for kickoff about one hour afterwards (approximately 7pm).
