When the Dartmouth men's soccer team entered its showdown with Cornell on Saturday the Big Green held their fate in the Ivy League in their own hands.
Their task was simple -- a win against Cornell would keep them in the driver's seat for the Ivy League title. Unfortunately, lady luck was not with Dartmouth on Saturday as the Big Green suffered an exasperating 3-2 overtime loss to the Big Red.
With the loss Dartmouth fell to 5-6-1 overall and 2-1-1 in the Ivy League. While Cornell, who was ranked 21st in NSCAA national coaches poll, improved to 9-2-1 overall and 3-1-1 in the Ivies.
The game was a tight physical war with both teams trading penalties and goals in regulation.
Cornell tallied first at the 30:30 mark of the first half when Todd Jacobson netted a goal.
Dartmouth responded to tie the game with 13 minutes gone in the second half on a nifty give-and-go from Noah Waterhouse '97 to Methembe Ndlovu '97.
The game remained tied until 10 minutes into the first overtime period when Ndlovu scored his second goal of the day as broke free from the Cornell defender and slipped a shot past Cornell goalie Hemant Sharma.
The Big Green held onto the lead going into the second overtime period, but that's as close as they got to victory.
Cornell tied the game on a goal by John Bernard with about 10 minutes remaining in overtime.
The final blow came with just 41 seconds left in the extra period. Rob Elliot bounced a shot off a Dartmouth defender from 30 yards out. As keeper Matt Streng '98 was moving to his left to stop the softly deflected shot he slipped on the wet grass and was not able to recover to make the save and the ball went easily into the back of net.
"We didn't stick to our game plan in overtime," Keith Zadourian '98 said. "They like to push the ball up, so we had been playing a lot of balls up top. On the last goal they just caught us and countered."
Although this defeat is costly for the Big Green, it is not the end of the Ivy League title hopes.
"We have to beat Harvard next weekend and then make sure we win the rest of our league games," Zadourian said. "If Cornell wins the rest of their games too we would be co-champs, but they would get the bid to the NCAA tournament, because they hold the tiebreaker. We really need Cornell to lose or tie a game."
The Big Green will try to get back on track Wednesday afternoon as they travel to Rhode Island to take on the Friars of Providence College.
