Sockers Match Preview At Utica
The San Diego Sockers—presented by Kaiser Permanente—wrap up a challenging East Coast weekend back-to-back with a Sunday afternoon matinee against Utica City FC at the Adirondack Bank Center in Utica, New York. The match is scheduled for a 12:00pm kickoff, and can be viewed domestically on MASL TV on YouTube, as well as supplemental coverage on the National Soccer Network and Victory+, and international coverage on Sportworld and the Unbeaten Network. UCFC will play as the “Utica Riggies” for this weekend’s match.
The Sockers (4-2-1, 13 points) have won four of five matches, pushing up into a second-place tie with Milwaukee in the eight-team Major Arena Soccer League (MASL) standings table. The club has three matches in hand over first-place Kansas City, which leads the league with 18 points but has completed ten matches already. Milwaukee and Kansas City play one another on Sunday. San Diego is in the midst of one of their most challenging road trips in club history, a six-game set that stretches across the month of January and includes two back-to-backs, two cross-country flights, and a third trip to the Midwest. The trip began last weekend with a maximum degree of difficulty, as San Diego played a Saturday night home win over Empire and then flew on the following Sunday morning to Tacoma, Washington, arriving less than five hours before kickoff and suffering a 5-4 loss as a result. Today’s match represents an even more difficult travel challenge, as the team had to bus six hours overnight from Baltimore to Utica, and will kick off just 21 hours after their match began against the Blast the day prior.
San Diego did manage to pack a victory into the overhead bin on their bus, coming away from Baltimore’s SECU Arena with a 9-6 win on Saturday night. A slow start saw the Sockers fall behind 3-0 in the first half before rallying on a pair of goals in the final two minutes before halftime, both coming off the legs of Blast defenders for own goals. The fortunate turn sparked a five-goal run, as Nick Perera completed his hat trick at 10:52 of the third quarter, giving San Diego their first lead of the night at 4-3. Charlie Gonzalez and Kraig Chiles each posted a goal and assist in the fourth quarter, and goalkeeper Boris Pardo was strong between the pipes all night, collecting 18 saves for his third win of the season.
Sunday’s matchup is the first of two between the Sockers and Utica this season. UCFC will travel to Oceanside to take on San Diego at Frontwave Arena on February 7. As geographically separated as two clubs in the MASL can be (2,737 miles), the Sockers and Utica don’t meet often. The Sockers hold a 3-0 all-time record against Utica, including 2-0 at “The Bank”.
The “Riggies” (2-2-1, 5 points) have played the fewest matches in the MASL, and on Sunday will feature at home for the fifth time in six matches to start the season. Utica started the year with a pair of home losses to Kansas City, rallied from 6-1 down in the second half to beat Milwaukee 7-6 in OT, then lost to Baltimore 5-2. In their most recent game and only road contest, Utica rallied past the Blast for a 7-6 OT win at SECU Arena. Forward Sergio Pinal is the focus of the Utica attack, with (7-7=14) points in five starts and a league-leading 2.8 points-per-match. Former Tacoma and Empire midfielder Willie Spurr is second on Utica with (2-5=7) points, and Barbaro Shelier ranks second on the team with four goals. San Diego loaned goalkeeper Xavier Snaer-Williams to Utica this season but he has yet to start a match and has played fewer than three minutes all season. Brian Wilkin is the starting goalkeeper, with a 6.59 GAA and .644 SV%.