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Southwest Mississippi Community College

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Bears' season ends with playoff loss at Itawamba

By: Michael D. Gunnell, Southwest Sports Information
P J IRWIN

Men's Soccer | 10/25/2017 7:41:00 PM

The 2017 soccer season came to an unfortunate end for the Bears Wednesday afternoon in Fulton as they were defeated by the host Itawamba Indians 2-1 in the quarterfinal round of the MACJC state/NJCAA Region 23 tournament.

The loss gave the Bears a final record of 10-4-2 for the season. Itawamba moved to 9-5-1and advance to Saturday's semi-final round.

Itawamba took a 1-0 lead on a goal by Alexis Resendiz in the 15th minute and held the same slim lead at the end of the half.

The Bears knotted the score at 1-1 in the 60th minute when the ball was played to Connor Smith who then passed it through the defense to PJ Irwin. Irwin then then scored after going one-on-one with the keeper.

Itawamba scored what proved to be the winner on Logan Little's goal in the 75th minute.

Bears' keeper Conner Smothers had seven saves in goal.

"I'm not as disappointed with the loss so much as I am with our performance," said Bears' head coach Zach Mills. "Not taking anything away from Itawamba, (but) I believe that was one of our worst games (of the season) and I do hate that we couldn't have performed better on a day it mattered."

Mills said it was also unfortunate that the Bears were without several key players due to injuries and had "one of my top guys having to play (only) 20 to 30 minutes" due to recurring issues from a previous injury. Mills said that did not help and "I think the (rest of the) team was hurting with them so they didn't play like they could have and should have."

Despite the loss, Mills said he was still "very happy with the outcome of the season in general (with the team) overcoming adversity (with) all the injuries and some pretty wild situations (that) led to some crazy ups and downs for us."

He said this year's group of freshmen along with "the sophomores that I had, the guys that worked so hard, the guys that believed in us last year, proved they could make a playoff run (again this year). It was good to see our young team stepping up when they had to. Apart from today, I'm very, very proud of the guys' hard work, making it as far as they did. I'm looking forward to the future."
 
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Players Mentioned

PJ Irwin

#3 PJ Irwin

MF
6' 3"
Freshman
Connor Smith

#20 Connor Smith

MF
6' 2"
Sophomore
Conner Smothers

#54 Conner Smothers

GK
5' 8"
Freshman

Players Mentioned

PJ Irwin

#3 PJ Irwin

6' 3"
Freshman
MF
Connor Smith

#20 Connor Smith

6' 2"
Sophomore
MF
Conner Smothers

#54 Conner Smothers

5' 8"
Freshman
GK