College Soccer

FINAL: Virginia 2, Pitt 0 (ACC Men’s Soccer Quarterfinal)

by
Brentaro Yamane
November 10, 2024

Photo courtesy Bentaro Yamane

ACC Men’s Soccer Quarterfinal Round

FINAL: Virginia 2, Pitt 0

Match Summary

The Pitt Panthers were the top seed heading into the 2024 ACC Men’s Soccer Tournament and the only team to have a bye and not play in the first round.

That didn’t matter to the Virginia Cavaliers, as in a span of 27 seconds, the 8-seeded side scored two goals in the second half, with Umberto Pela and AJ Smith delivering the blows to Pitt, in a 2-0 result at Ambrose Urbanic Field on Sunday night.

When both teams played in late October, Pitt had its most lopsided win in ACC play with a 4-1 win with the Panthers scoring all four goals in the first half.

Things were different this time around with the Cavaliers scoring more goals in this postseason contest, than they did in the regular season contest.

While the Panthers’ attack was stagnant for most of the contest, UVA capitalized in a flurry in the 67th minute.

After a free kick, Virginia’s Daniel Mangarov sent a bending ball into the box, which connected with Pela in the back of the net for a 1-0 lead.

ACC match officials dashed Pitt’s hopes of waving off the goal, as an extended VAR review confirmed that Pela was onside.

Only seconds after the ensuring kickoff, Pitt lost possession of the ball, with the Cavs quickly countering, as AJ Smith pushed his shot into left side of the net, as Pitt keeper Cabral Carter came way off his line to deny the shot, but couldn’t make the stop.

Pitt’s best chance to cut the lead in two came in the 81st minute, when Luis Sahmkow appeared to get in the box — using his chest to redirect a ball that bounced off a Virginia defender and into goal, but the chance was waved off and further denied by another VAR review.

For the Panthers, this is the second straight loss that resulted in a 2-0 defeat as Pitt lost its regular season finale against Syracuse by the same score on November 1.

The Cavaliers will play No. 5 Wake Forest in the ACC Semifinals on Thursday at WakeMed Soccer Park in Cary, North Carolina.

Look for a more detailed recap and reaction to follow.

PSN POST MATCH

‘We weren’t sharp enough’’

HC Jay Vidovich following @Pitt_MSOC 2-0 loss to Virginia in ACC Quarterfinal

🎥: @BrentaroYamane pic.twitter.com/PsDTOkCHhA

— Pittsburgh Soccer Now (@pghsoccernow) November 11, 2024

Match Updates

FINAL — VIRGINIA 2, PITT 0

After winning the ACC regular season title outright for the first time in program history, Pitt loses its first game in the ACC tournament.

In the all-time series, the Cavaliers now have won 11 of 18 meetings against Pitt.

"One game at a time."#GoHoos pic.twitter.com/rfivJ9T1ke

— Virginia Men's Soccer (@UVAMenSoccer) November 11, 2024

81′— Albert Thorsen attempts a pass toward Luis Sahmkow as he crashes toward the left side of the net. The pass goes off Sahmkow’s chest and hits off Cavaliers goalkeeper Tom Miles and rolls behind the back of the net. However, Sahmkow was ruled offside taking away the goal.

78′ — The first yellow card was issued in the game. Virginia’s Parker Sloan was given the card after wasting time during the free kick that Luis Sahmkow was attempting. Sloan committed a foul seconds before the play.

75 ‘— The Panthers made a lot of short passes around the perimeter of the box looking to find the perfect shot and score its first goal. But despite all the good passes, Casper Grening attempted a shot but was off target and wide to the right.

68′ — After Pitt lost possession of the ball, Virginia scores its second goal as AJ Smith kicked low toward the left side of the net, in which Carter could not dive to make the safe.

67′ — Virginia answers scoring the first goal of the night. After a free kick, Daniel Mangarov curved the ball toward the middle to Umberto Pela who gets in the back of the net for a 1-0 lead.

66′ — Pitt gets another close opportunity. Sahmkow’s displays a good pass to Albert Thorsen as he runs to the right side of the net and his shot hits the side of the net.

64′ — Pitt is awarded another kick. On the attempt, the ball swirled toward the middle of the goal. And Miles leaped high and hit the ball with one hand out of the box to event a goal.

62′ — The first shot is recorded in the second half by either team which is awarded to Cavaliers’ Joaquin Brizuela.

58′ — Virginia is awarded a corner kick after Victor Akoum kicks the ball that goes off of Felipe Mercado and goes behind the endline. On the attempt, Cabral Carter punched the ball out of the box. During the play as well, Nick Dang was fouled with a push off.

50′ — Free kick awarded to Pitt. Guilherme Feitosa’s kick toward the middle of the goal was headed away by Virginia.

HALF —PITT 0, VIRGINIA 0

When both teams played in the regular season back in late October, Pitt scored four first half goals. This time, Virginia made sure Pitt did not capitalize opportunities into goals.

At times fouls hurt the Cavaliers from scoring opportunities committing 10 penalties, which was better than the Panthers five penalties. The Panthers committed five corner kicks in the first half while the Cavaliers only had one opportunity. There was only one shot on goal by either team in the first half and that was by Panthers leading scorer, Luis Sahmkow.

34′ — Gremling’s shot is blocked Daniel Mangarov which forces another Pitt corner kick. The attempt sails out of bounds once again without a scoring chance.

26′ — Vilamitjana’s shot is blocked by a Cavaliers defender head just outside the penalty area.

21′ — Virginia attempts first corner kick of the night is headed away by the Panthers defense.

19′ — Virginia’s Victor Akoum loses the ball behind the end line to force the third corner kick for Pitt. On the attempt, Casper Gremling’s header goes above the crossbar.

4′ — Luis Sahmkow’s shot in the middle of the penalty box is stopped and saved by Tom Miles.

2′ — Pitt attempts two corner kicks in the second minute. Arnau Vilamitjana’s header on the first attempt is above the cross bar. The second attempt sails out of bounds.

Match Preview

They’re back — and this time as the top seed in the ACC Tournament after securing the ACC regular season title, finishing two points ahead of runner-up and last season’s National Champions, Clemson.

That’s right, the Pitt Panthers men’s soccer program will begin quest through the postseason on Sunday night, when they host No. 9 seed Virginia in the quarterfinals of the ACC Championship. The winner of Sunday’s match will advance to the semifinals, facing either No. 4 seed SMU or No. 5 seed Wake Forest, in Cary, NC, on Wednesday.

Pitt concluded its historic 2024 regular season with a 12-4 ledger, including a 6-2 mark in ACC play.

Pitt was picked to finish ninth in the league prior to the season, but with veteran Head Coach Jay Vidovich doing more masterful work in adding more talented pieces to the roster and guiding senior leaders who truly grabbed the bull by the horns, this year’s squad has shown it’s very capable of making a deep run through November and December, both in the ACC tournament and in the NCAA tournament too.

With a strong start to the season, Pitt caught lightning in a bottle, spending three weeks as the No. 1 team in the nation and clinching their first regular season ACC title in program history, setting them up for home playoff matches in the conference (and almost certainly the national) tournaments.

But, it won’t be easy.

The ACC tournament will provide a gauntlet of talented teams — none of whom they can take lightly, even Sunday’s opponents, Virginia, who they defeated a few weeks ago, by a 4-1 margin.

Taking Care of the Dirty Work: Pitt men’s soccer seniors spur a championship run

Following last season’s disappointment in the postseason (first round losses at home in both ACC tournament and NCAA tournament) served as a sort of wake up call, spurring the Panthers (and especially their veteran leaders) to take nothing for granted as they head into knockout round phases of the program’s revitalized season.

“The guys that were here last year, they really [hurt their] pride [after] what happened,” Guilherme Feitosa, senior midfielder, told Pittsburgh Soccer Now‘s Griffin Floyd.

“They were like ‘I don’t want to be part of a losing program, I don’t want to be part of a program that loses in the early stages of the NCAA Tournament.’ And us coming back with that mentality also raises the level of the guys at the bottom of the group.”

Vidovich also said that his seniors’ willingness to take on the “dirty work” of coaching, holding each other to a higher standard after lackadaisical or selfish play burned them in 2023, helps make his life easier.

“It makes your job easier, it allows you to do different things. That means they’re taking care of a lot of the dirty work. This team is self-policed, it really does take care of a lot of the dirty work you don’t have to do,” Vidovich said. “When individually they’ve got that ambition to also police themselves, and then when the collective is doing it, that’s when you have something magic. And we’re hoping to get there.”

Virginia Cavaliers: A Closer Look

Pitt has played in the ACC Tournament Final just one time (a loss at Clemson in 2021) — so lifting the conference tournament hardware is something that this program would love to do — and they’ll get started in this quest by taking on Virginia in a rematch of its 4-1 victory on Oct. 25 at Ambrose Urbanic Field.

With that victory, Pitt snapped Virginia’s five match winning streak, which was the third-longest streak in Division I coming into the match.

Defensively, Pitt limited Virginia to only five shot attempts with just one coming on frame. Of note, Virginia came into that match averaging 12.9 shots per game.

The ninth-seeded Cavaliers have since bounced back and are coming off a 2-1 come-from-behind victory over eighth-seeded and 21st-ranked NC State on Wednesday.

Virginia tallied a pair of second half-goals in a 20-second span. The win marked UVA’s first comeback win in the ACC tournament since a 3-1 win over Clemson in the 2019 title game.

Virginia’s Nick Dang leads the Cavaliers this season with six goals on the year. Dang’s goal tally currently ranks first among defenders in NCAA Division I.

PITT MSOC MATCH NOTES

No. 1 in RPI
Despite dropping three of its last five matches, Pitt holds the number one spot in the latest RPI rankings. The Panthers own an impressive 6-1 record in quadrant 1 matches and have five wins over teams ranked in the top 20 of RPI.

National Rankings
Pitt ranks seventh in the country in goals against average (.750) and 15th in goals (36). The Panthers also rank sixth nationally in goal differential (26). Individually, senior midfielder Guilherme Feitosa ranks second in the ACC and 12th nationally with nine assists this season.