On Saturday evening, the No. 20 Kentucky men’s soccer team was able to overcome a poor early offensive performance, coming away with a win against the No. 14 Charlotte 49ers. It took the Cats until late in double overtime to find the back of the net, but it was enough to win by a final score of 1-0.

Coming off a tie with Lipscomb, the Cats were tasked with stopping a red-hot Charlotte 49ers team that had only lost one game all season. Charlotte stood atop the Conference USA standings, and looked like the favorite to win the conference tournament. The Cats came in a bit rough around the edges, having gone 1-1 in conference play, and seemingly cooled off from their brief win streak last month.

This, of course, didn’t seem to discourage the Cats.

In the first half, the strength of the 49ers was apparent. They didn’t allow a single shot on goal by UK, while notching two themselves, and taking six more that missed. This resulted in what seemed like frustration by a pressured UK team, and they received two yellow cards in the span of less than ten minutes, on seniors Jordan Wilson and Napo Matsoso. The half was extremely physical, with 17 fouls called total. During the “hostile” Louisville match earlier in the season, there were only 30 called all 90 minutes.

“They’re a tough team,” Wilson said following the win. “But every game in the season, especially in the conference, is tough. So this was no different.”

The second half was more of the same physicality and lack of offense. Both teams were extremely physical throughout, and tensions flared in the 57^th minute of play after a hard foul by Napo Matsoso.

“You know, college soccer is physical,” goalkeeper Stuart Ford said. “They’ll try and make you play at their pace, and we can’t do that. We had to push back.”

An altercation followed, and the six players involved were separated before the issue escalated. Nobody scored in this half either, and at the end of regulation, UK still had yet to achieve a shot on goal.

And then it started raining.

Overtime was loaded with players and slipping and falling throughout the entire period. If either team was hoping to score, they didn’t much look like it. Most players were simply trying to stay on their feet during the extremely physical period. So, for the second time in UK’s last four games, the game went into double overtime.

And, in an unbelievable turn, UK had two quick shots on goal, the first being deflected, and the second being a goal scored by senior defender Wilson, off a corner kick from his fellow captain Matsoso. And so, in the 8^th minute of double overtime, UK finished off the tough 49ers in dramatic fashion.

“We had to give it everything,” Wilson said. “We knew we had ten minutes left to win, the rest of the game before didn’t matter. We had to use everything else in the tank.”

The four game home stand ended with this game, and the Cats will be back in action on October 5^th at 7 p.m. at Evansville.