Overtime goal ends Dalton State's season in NAIA quarterfinals
Dec. 2—As Lindsey Wilson College's Sadam Masereka sprinted toward the fluttering ball in front of the Dalton State net, all the Roadrunners could do was watch as their national championship hopes were all but ended.
In the first overtime period in the NAIA men's soccer national quarterfinals on Thursday, Masereka charged toward the ball, made a move to beat its intended target — Roadrunner goalkeeper Michael Barrueta — and tapped home the game-winning goal.
Dalton State couldn't answer in the remaining 6:44 in the first overtime or in the 10 minutes of the second, and a stellar season for Dalton State ended with a 1-0 defeat to Lindsey Wilson in the national quarterfinals in Decatur, Alabama. Lindsey Wilson (13-6-4), which entered the final site of the tournament as the 10th seed out of 10 teams, upset second-seeded Dalton State (16-2-3) to advance to the national semifinals on Saturday.
The teams had played to a scoreless draw through 90 minutes of regulation play, necessitating the two 10-minute extra periods.
Less than four minutes into the first extra frame, Dalton State's Frank Rodriguez tried to pass back to Barrueta, but the ball lazily listed toward the keeper. Masereka ran it down, dodged Barrueta, scored and was mobbed by his celebrating teammates.
The Roadrunners tried to equalize with frenzied attempts in the remaining extra time, but the once-top-ranked Roadrunners couldn't score to keep the season going, suffering just their second defeat on the year.
The first half ended with both teams having tallied five shots and one on goal, but Lindsey Wilson upped its aggression after half.
Barrueta made a diving kick save to keep the Blue Raiders off the board midway through the second half, and Rodriguez jumped in front of a pass on a two-on-one that could have led to an easy Lindsey Wilson goal in the final moments of regulation.
The Blue Raiders ended with 14 shots to Dalton State's eight. Six were on frame for the Blue Raiders, while Dalton State managed just two on goal. Masereka had four of the on-goal shots for Lindsey Wilson.
Leonardo Seixas had half of Dalton State's shots and shots on goal. Rasmus Andersson also got one on frame.
The Roadrunners ran into a Blue Raider team that wasn't even ranked at the conclusion of the regular season but caught fire late in the year and into the postseason.
Lindsey Wilson started the season 1-5-2 but completely flipped the early-season script. The Blue Raiders went 6-1-1 the rest of the regular season, then rolled through two higher-seeded teams to win the Mid-South Conference Championship. Lindsey Wilson, winners of nine total NAIA men's soccer championships, then entered the NAIA tournament as a fourth-seeded team in a four-team opening-rounds bracket. Wins over Grace College and Keiser got them to Decatur, and a 4-0 win over St. Thomas set up the Blue Raiders against Dalton State.
The loss ended the season of a Roadrunner team that finished the regular season undefeated, spent numerous weeks as the top-ranked team in the country and won the Southern States Athletic Conference regular season title.
The first loss for the Roadrunners was a defeat to Life in the SSAC semis, and Lindsey Wilson handed them their second in the NAIA quarterfinals. Dalton State was the second of the highly-seeded teams to go down in an upset on Thursday. No. 1 overall seed Mid-America Christian was knocked off by Rio Grande earlier in the day.
Dalton State still finished with the deepest run in the NAIA tournament in program history. The Roadrunners had never won a game in the national tournament before winning one last year. Dalton State hosted first and second round action, defeating Columbia International and Indiana Tech to advance into the 10-team final site bracket.
