FLORENCE, S.C. - The Georgia Southwestern men's soccer team took fans on a roller coaster ride of emotions in its 7-3 Peach Belt Conference loss at Francis Marion University on Saturday evening. After scoring three times in under 12 minutes late in the second half to pull within 4-3, GSW surrendered three goals in six minutes down the stretch to suffer its 12th loss of the season.
GSW drops to 2-12-1 overall and 1-8 in the PBC. Francis Marion improves to 4-8-2 overall while picking up its first conference win (1-5-2) this fall.
The Hurricanes trailed 2-0 at the halftime break after allowing an own goal in the 10th minute and a score from Ryan Begg at the 23:50 mark.
FMU opened its advantage to 4-0 with goals in the 52nd and 59th minutes.
Moments later, GSW began its charge. Michael Corrigan began the rally with a goal at 62:57 off an assist from David McManus. McManus followed with a feed to Charlie Curran who buried a 40-yard blast into the netting at 66:41 to trim the Patriot lead to 4-2. KleesBatner Loembet-Makaya then took a pass from Corrigan and scored on a 14-yard shot from the right side to cut the margin to 4-3 at the 74:38 mark.
As quickly as the Hurricanes had made it a game again, the Patriots moved even faster to squash thoughts of a comeback with an onslaught of scores.
Tom Gillette struck the first blow in the 82nd minute with an unassisted score from 19 yards out. Robin Schittenhelm tacked on a goal less than four minutes later and the final tally came at the end of the 88th minute with Gillette's second goal of the night.
Francis Marion outshot Georgia Southwestern 17-14, and led 7-4 in corner kicks.
Cade Jones saved six for GSW. Logan Fisher stopped four for FMU.
Southwestern returns home to wrap up the 2012 season with a pair of non-conference matches at Hurricane Field. GSW hosts Talladega College on Wednesday at 3:30 p.m.
The Fourth Annual "Couch Potato Challenge" is taking place at Wednesday's match. A $100 gift certificate to 2Duke's Bar-B-Que will be presented to the best couch potato setup. Read more about the event by clicking here.