Historic Kentucky men’s soccer season ends in heartbreak in NCAA Tournament Sweet 16
In the end, once the shock had subsided and the reality was realized, Johan Cedergren hugged his players and expressed his gratitude to them.
It was a moment of finality, one that Cedergren and his Kentucky men’s soccer team didn’t want to have until at least December, when at worst they would have matched the best postseason in program history with a trip to the NCAA Tournament quarterfinals.
But Kentucky fell one step short of that stage, its season coming to an end Sunday night in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament after a 2-1 loss at Clemson.
UK trailed early after a 14th-minute shot by Clemson’s Callum Johnson deflected off current Wildcat Mason Visconti — a former Clemson player — and past UK goalkeeper Jan Hoffelner.
The Wildcats rallied late, with defender Lucca Rodrigues powerfully heading home a cross from midfielder Nick Gutmann in the 85th minute to score for the second straight match and seemingly ensure sudden-death extra time.
Then, with just 68 seconds left until the end of regulation, Clemson’s Justin Malou slotted a pass to teammate Alvaro Gomez, who charged forward and poked the ball past a desperately on-rushing Hoffelner and into the net to decide the match and send Clemson through to an Elite Eight showdown with No. 1 seed Oregon State.
It was the most emotional of swings that ended a historic season for the Kentucky men’s soccer program.
“As a coach you’re playing every kick and you want to find some way to be on the field yourself ... you could see it on our team, you can see even on the staff’s faces, they were just shell-shocked,” Cedergren said postgame. “For our guys in a knockout tournament at some point it has to end. We didn’t want it to end today, and I think we did more than enough for it not to end, but unfortunately it did.”
Clemson head coach Mike Noonan summed it up succinctly.
“Our game can be cruel at times,” he said.
The Wildcats’ finishing record of 15-2-4 (W-L-D) included the best start to a season in school history, as UK went undefeated through its first 14 matches before losing 2-1 in overtime at Charlotte on Oct. 30. The season also saw Kentucky bring home a trophy by winning the Conference USA Tournament on a golden goal in extra time by Eythor Bjorgolfsson this month.
But a third trip to the Sweet 16 in four seasons ended in defeat due to factors both in and out of UK’s control.
Kentucky was the No. 9 seed for the NCAA Tournament and was up against the No. 8 seed Clemson. This meant the Tigers got to host Sunday night’s Sweet 16 match at Historic Riggs Field in Clemson, where a crowd of nearly 1,800 fans gave the hosts an advantage.
Additionally, after the match Cedergren cited four occasions — two in each half — when he thought Kentucky had a claim for a penalty kick, only to be denied each time by match referee Matthew Thompson.
“People have been asking me about that eight and nine seed and whether that makes a difference. I think that if you get this game at home, I think it’s a huge difference,” Cedergren said. “I think that it’s a very, very different game if it’s played at our place.”
“To be perfectly honest with you, you win that game because we’re at home and because our crowd is here,” Noonan, the Clemson head coach, said. “My experience in the tournament says that it’s not who you play in the NCAA Tournament, it’s where you play.”
Then there were missed opportunities by the Wildcats themselves.
Forwards Luke Andrews and Daniel Evans — who each finish the season tied for the team lead in goals along with Rodrigues and Bjorgolfsson with five — both missed clear scoring opportunities in the first half, placing shots from the edge of the 18-yard box wide of goal.
“I think Clemson maybe just had that one player when those key moments come, that they’re going to put the ball in the net,” Cedergren said. “We’re really good, we have really good players. But I think that to make a real, deep run you need a special player, maybe we don’t have enough attacking special players right now.”
Kentucky directed only three of its 11 shots in the match on target, and failed to capitalize on the quality scoring chances that came from having more possession and being more dangerous in the attacking third than Clemson over the 90 minutes.
“I think we did more than enough to get a result today,” Cedergren said, citing the depth of his Kentucky team that saw 15 different players play at least 20 minutes. “We definitely got some chances today and unfortunately we were just able to put one in.”
The importance of figuring out how to advance from the Sweet 16, and not just simply how to get there, wasn’t lost on Cedergren after the match.
“At Kentucky it’s not about making Sweet 16s or making the NCAA Tournament, it’s about winning the whole thing ... we want to get to a Final Four, we want to win a national championship,” Cedergren said. “I think the really exciting part for me is that the administration at Kentucky, they give you everything that you need. I think there’s lots of places where you have to fund-raise and there’s all kinds of sacrifices that you have to make that I don’t have to.”
But Cedergren was also quick to praise Kentucky’s seniors and graduating players and those that have lifted the standard of Kentucky men’s soccer in recent seasons.
Over the last four seasons, Kentucky has compiled a combined 59-14-10 mark that includes four NCAA Tournament trips, five NCAA Tournament wins, three appearances in the Sweet 16, one appearance in the national quarterfinals and three trophies from C-USA play.
It’s a far cry from when Cedergren was hired at Kentucky in December 2011 and was told that he would need to make the NCAA Tournament to earn a new contract, something he did in his first season as head coach in 2012.
“I think we’ve raised the bar to another level,” Cedergren said of the last four years of UK men’s soccer. “We just have to find a way to reload and come back and do this again next year.”
This story was originally published November 29, 2021 at 7:57 AM.
