Junior forward Max Mogul was able to give the Saints a 1-0 lead in the second half, but three unanswered Red Dragon goals led to the St. Lawrence University men's soccer team falling 3-1 to No. 10 SUNY Cortland on Sunday afternoon at Sandy MacAllaster Field.

St. Lawrence fell to 0-1-1 on the season with the loss, while the Red Dragons improved to 1-1-0.

"I'm very proud of the team today, we showed a tremendous amount of character having to play with ten for almost 40 minutes," said head coach Mike Toshack "It was especially courageous and tenacious considering we also had to play a man down in the heat. In the second half it was very difficult being down and we made some mistakes that cost us against a good team. We took a step forward today and showed alot of character and grit. In the first half, I thought we did very well to go ahead with the goal, but the game of soccer can turn pretty quick with red cards. We look forward to heading down to play Hartwick and Oneonta next weekend."

In a battle between two of the country's best teams there was just one shot on the frame in the first 45 minutes of play. However, the most dangerous looks came on attempts that never found the goalkeepers.

Just 3:28 into the contest, Mogul had the ball on the left side of the pitch where he juked a defender and ripped a shot on the Cortland frame. The shot rang off the bottom of the crossbar and looked like it was going across the goal line, but the officials waved off the would-be goal to keep the game even.



Later in the half in the 29th minute, the Scarlet and Brown nearly scored again when Owen Lillis was sent a pass in the Cortland box. The midfielders shot sailed just wide left of the woodwork to keep it at 0-0. The lone shot of the half came from Michael McDougald, whose hard-hit free kick was stymied by Jordan Ott in net.

The scoring was finally broken in the 50th minute after Mogul was hauled down in the box by Alex Lessman. The junior forward was afforded a penalty kick which he capitalized on to take the lead.

Moments later, the ball would swing down to the Saints end where St. Lawrence was flagged for a handball in the box. Riley Williams would capitalize on the penalty kick and the Saints were left with ten players for the remaining 39 minutes of the contest.

The tie game was broken in the 55th minute when an errant pass from the Scarlet and Brown was taken by Matias Valenzuela Matic, who beat Ben Woelfinger to give his team the lead. Riley Williams would pick up his second goal of the game in the 63rd minute to all but put the game out of reach for St. Lawrence.

Woelfinger finished the game with two saves in net, while Ott stopped three shots and was helped by the crossbar to keep the Saints at bay.

The Red Dragons finished with a 10-8 advantage in shots and were up 5-4 in shots on frame.

The Scarlet and Brown will look to regroup as the squad heads to Oneonta, N.Y. next weekend to take on Hartwick on Saturday, September 9 then SUNY Oneonta on September 10.