Men’s soccer falls short in loss to Notre Dame

Pitt men’s soccer suffered its fifth loss of the season Saturday, losing to No. 21 Notre… Pitt men’s soccer suffered its fifth loss of the season Saturday, losing to No. 21 Notre Dame on the road, 3-1.

The loss dropped Pitt’s overall record to 3-5-2 and its Big East conference record to 2-2-1. The Notre Dame Fighting Irish climbed to 5-3-2 and 3-2 in the conference.

“They’re a good team,” Pitt head coach Joe Luxbacher said. “We weren’t as sharp as we needed to be. We really need to score more goals because we’ve been solid defensively.”

Pitt will play a pair of home matches this week, hosting Robert Morris Wednesday in a non-conference contest before Marquette comes to town Sunday for a Big East matchup.

At Alumni Field in South Bend, Ind., Pitt fell behind in the 21st minute when Notre Dame sophomore Matt Besler chipped Justin McGeeney’s cross into the right corner of the net.

The Panthers equalized early in the second half when senior Keeyan Young gathered a rebound off Notre Dame goalkeeper Chris Cahill and tucked it neatly in the back of the net in the 47th minute.

The goal was Young’s 23rd tally in a Pitt uniform, pushing the forward into sole possession of sixth on the all-time scoring list. With one more score, Young would move into a tie for fourth place.

“He’s a real talented player,” Luxbacher said. “He can do even more, and we’re hoping he has a big second half. He can really help us up front — he’s just been unlucky around the net so far this season.”

Less than 10 minutes later, Notre Dame regained the lead. Junior forward Joseph Lapira slid to catch up to a Nate Norman cross, redirecting the ball past Pitt goalkeeper Andy Jorgensen.

In the 71st minute, Notre Dame put the game away, with Lapira scoring yet again. His second goal of the game pushed his season total to nine.

Lapira drilled a shot from 18 yards out past Pitt goalkeeper Andy Jorgensen, providing the dagger in the match.

“It was nice to see [Lapira] get another two goals,” Notre Dame head coach Bobby Clark told www.und.com. “The third goal was nice because it put the game out of reach, which should have been done sooner. He is becoming very hard to hold down.”

Jorgensen, a senior, parried six shots for the Panthers. Notre Dame fired 24 shots toward Jorgensen to Pitt’s nine.

“[Jorgensen] has been really sharp for us the past few games,” Luxbacher said. “We didn’t have three of our starting four defenders because they’re out hurt, but we can’t make excuses.

“It just didn’t go as well as we wanted it to. Notre Dame is a good team and we have to be sharper against teams like that.”

Cahill stopped just one shot for the Fighting Irish, but still collected his fourth win between the pipes for Notre Dame.

“You know we just didn’t have a good day,” Luxbacher said. “Everyone is in this together and we just weren’t as sharp as we needed to be — players, coaches, everyone.”

The Panthers reduced their conceded corner kicks, only allowing three to the Fighting Irish. It has been an ongoing struggle for Pitt to cut down its opponents’ chances off corners.

“We’ve tightened up on corners,” Luxbacher said. “We reduced the number of corners and we’ve been doing that more and more lately. But we didn’t defend well enough. We gave up too many chances and against good teams, that’s going to cause trouble.”

According to Luxbacher, Pitt is ready to bounce back.

“It’s going to be a tough week ahead of us,” Luxbacher said. “Marquette is a lot like us — they defend really well but they don’t score that often. So we can expect a defensive game against them.

“Robert Morris is a good team. I’ve watched them this year and they beat us last year, so they are real tough. But we will be ready to go. Again, we just need to score more and we will be prepared to win.”