Stanford men's soccer cruised to a 5-1 victory against Sacramento State to open the regular season.
On Thursday, No. 13 Stanford men’s soccer defeated Sacramento State 5-1 to open up the regular season at Cagan Stadium. Redshirt sophomore midfielder Trevor Islam (44:50 & 71:21) had a brace in the match with his two goals while Fletcher Bank (1:27), Zach Bohane (16:59), and Jack Pymm (52:03) also scored for the Cardinal. The lone goal for the Hornets was scored at 35:10 by Donovan Sessoms via penalty kick. Stanford improves to 1-0 on the season while Sacramento State falls to 0-1.
BOX SCORE: Stanford vs. Sacramento State-Thursday, August 21st
“Well, what an emphatic victory, what a great way to start the season,” Stanford head coach Jeremy Gunnsaid after the match. “You know, you work hard in preseason and then in the first game you’ve seen people do great in scrimmages and you still have to wait to see how they’re going to perform. Once it’s counting and we just had an incredible account of ourselves today.”
Stanford got off to a strong start in this match as Fletcher Bank quickly scored at the 1:27 mark, finding the top right of the goal off his right foot thanks to an assist from Alfonso Tenconi-Gradillas. That made it a 1-0 lead for the Cardinal.
“Naturally, scoring so early is a huge bonus, but it’s a great goal, great finish,” Gunn said. “And then, from that point in time, you know, we had 20 minutes where Sac State just couldn’t find the ball and we were just so dominant. It was so exciting to watch.”
Shortly after a yellow card against Leonardo Martinez of Sac State at the 16:16 mark, Zach Bohane found the top right of the goal off his left foot thanks to an assist from Will Cleary at the 16:59 mark. That made it a 2-0 lead for the Cardinal.
Stanford would then get corner kicks at 19:04 and 28:28, though neither would lead to a goal. Sac State tried to get going a bit with a corner kick at 22:54, but that too failed to deliver anything. Keeping it 2-0. However, Sac State would get on the board at 36:10 as Donovan Sessoms was fouled, setting up a penalty kick. Stanford goalkeeper Rowan Schnebly was unable to guess right, as Sessoms found the bottom right of the net.
Fortunately for Stanford, they were able to get one more goal before halftime to maintain a two-goal lead as Trevor Islam found the bottom right of the goal off his right foot as he got a rebound off a shot that had been blocked by the Hornets. That gave Stanford a 3-1 lead heading into halftime.
“Oh, I mean, all credit to the other guys,” Islam said of his first goal. “Taka put a great ball in the box and Eric hit it on frame and when he hit it on frame, good things happen. I was just in the right spot and yeah, it was a team goal for sure.
“Yeah, I think we knew that if we could score, put a few goals past them, we could bury them. So, yeah, definitely a crucial time in the game, had to be at our best and we were.”
“Just truly, truly excited about the first half of course,” Gunn said. “There’s a couple of errors here and there and they managed to get a goal in that, that makes it a bit more interesting and suddenly changes the game and the flow a little bit. But overall, we couldn’t have scripted it much better for a home opener…It’s big because if you’re talking about a boxing match, we were five rounds ahead at one point and they were, they should have been knocked out, you know? But because it’s soccer and goals are so scarce, they score a goal back when we’ve been clearly dominating and at that moment in a game of soccer it’s game on. And so if they had managed to keep the game 2-1 until halftime, then I think it’s a different game.
“And so credit to the attacking players who went into the game, and they managed to consolidate the lead that really put us back in our place and then it really changes the halftime talk for their team. They’ve managed to claw their way back into a game only to get knocked back again. I think that really took the wind out of their sails and really put is in a much better position going into the second half.”
In the second half, Stanford continued to apply the pressure on Sac State. After a corner kick at 51:24, Stanford was able to make it 4-1 as Jack Pymm found the bottom left of the goal off his left foot thanks to an assist by Joshua Partal. That made it 4-1.
Over the next 16 minutes, seven fouls were committed collectively by both teams as things started getting chippy. Stanford wasn’t done scoring though as Islam found the bottom left of the goal off his right foot at 71:21.
“Another great team goal,” Islam said. “Zach put the ball on frame and again, just in the right spot. Super happy not to miss, you know, to finish it, but yeah, I mean, we have a great team and scoring a lot of goals, so that’s good.”
Given it was the third goal of Islam’s career and the second of the match, he was beyond fired up, doing a backflip in the corner of Cagan to celebrate. Up 5-1 with under 20 minutes to go, Stanford was sitting pretty.
“Yeah, it feels amazing,” Islam said. “I mean, you never know, what game is going to be your day or what game is going to be your game. What day is going to be your day. So yeah, super exciting for me…I have been thinking about it [the back flip] for a few games. Yeah, what would I do if I scored. So, I was a little too excited after the first one, but I got my legs under me and was able to do it for the second goal.”
From there, Stanford would go on to win 5-1 as Sac State was unable to add another goal to make the score look more respectable. From start to finish, Stanford was in control and the final score reflected that.
For Stanford, this was a nice way to start the season. They could have come out sluggish, but they took advantage of the three exhibitions they had to play quality soccer and play sharp. They didn’t let the heat of the day slow them down. They just rehydrated and came out on top. All in all, they should be pleased with how the match went.
“I thought there were so many great performances,” Gunn said of his team. “There were some fantastic firsts in careers. You know, people got their first time on the pitch. People got their first starts, people scored goals at the beginning of the season, and so the positives are amazing today and obviously, you know, with a double-game weekend, it was great to be able to continue to look at different people in different positions and continue to trust the people making an impact.”
Up next for Stanford is a home match against No. 4 Denver on Sunday, August 24th. That will begin at 7:00 PM PT.
“Yeah, I haven’t given it too much thought yet,” Gunn said of facing the Pioneers. “But now we go in the locker room after we’ve spoken to the team, we’ll be talking about them immediately. Look, they’ve had a great team. We played a very tight game with them last year where basically they capitalized on one moment. And so, always a very tough team to play against, always very disciplined, very organized, and an excellent soccer team. So we know it will be a super tough game. It’ll be a really exciting one and I think the temperature will be a little bit cooler and our players hopefully are chopping at the bit, ready to get into them.”
“I mean, all focus forward,” Islam added. “We love to play teams we’ve played before. We’re super excited. We’re going to take it to them and beat them.”
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