Union Omaha came to Statesboro on the hottest streak ever seen in USL1. They were unbeaten in 12 straight matches dating back to their last matchup with South Georgia Tormenta on July 29.
During that stretch, Omaha set a league record with 10 consecutive victories so Tormenta knew it was going to be a tall task Saturday night as Tormenta was fighting for the final playoff spot.
South Georgia was able to keep it close in the first half. But in the 39th minute, Tormenta’s Daltyn Knutson brought down Omaha’s Steevan Dos Santos just outside the penalty area, drawing a red card and making an already difficult assignment even more difficult.
“You can’t go a man down to them,” said Manager Ian Cameron following the match. “Even giving up the lead at the start of the game, you still plan to come back and score some goals.
“They’re not a team that’s going to get complacent. They take their jobs very, very seriously and their coaching stays on top of them all the way to the end as a good coaching staff should.”
Omaha (18-5-8, 62 points) would go on to score three second half goals to take the 4-0 win and leave Tormenta (12-14-5, 41 points) to scoreboard watch as they needed a Forward Madison loss or draw to keep their playoff hopes alive.
Defender Jake Dengler came in shortly after Knutson’s red card as he made his return following several weeks out due to a hamstring injury.
“It was great being back but obviously the result and going in down a guy wasn’t what I expected for my return. The guys fought to the end and the result didn’t go our way,” Dengler said.
Tormenta had an excellent chance early to take the lead as Tobias Otieno created space near the top of the penalty box. He slid a pass to Pedro Fonseca near the penalty spot who was able to get a shot off, but Omaha keeper Rashid Nuhu was able to make the save to keep the game scoreless.
Five minutes later, Omaha’s John Scearce blasted a shot from 30 yards out that Tormenta goalkeeper Pablo Jara was able to block, but Dos Santos followed up the blocked shot and buried it in the back of the net to give Omaha a 1-0 lead.
Just two minutes later, in the 17th minute, Dos Santos nearly scored again, but his header off a corner kick hit off the top of the crossbar and over to keep the score 1-0.
Tormenta nearly evened the score late in the first half when Chris Heckenberg stole the ball near midfield. Eventually the ball found its way to Mukwelle Akale on the right near the endline. His cross was smothered by Nuhu to end the threat.
Omaha would use their man advantage to dominate the second half, scoring three goals, including two goals in an 81 second span. The first from Noe Meza on an assist from Lagos Kunga.
Moments later, Kunga would do the scoring as he intercepted a pass and was able to get his shot past Jara to quickly turn a 1-0 game into a 3-0 game and realistically end any hopes of a Tormenta comeback.
Omaha would add another goal in the 81st minute by Joe Brito to cap off the scoring for Omaha.
On the night, Tormenta was outshot 22-3, including 9-1 in shots on target.
“Initial thoughts, probably frustration first and a little bit of embarrassment, but whenever you go against a team that’s as good as Omaha when they’re playing as well as they are and going down to 10 men, it was always going to be tough,” said Heckenberg. “I think we could have managed it better, but when you’re going for it, sometimes you make mistakes and concede goals and that’s what happened tonight.”
“They were able to find a lot of spaces, especially (11 against 10),” Dengler said. “They were able to find the gaps in between and then get behind us pretty easily and that’s something we’ll have to fix.”
Fortunately for Tormenta, Northern Colorado scored two second half goals to take a 2-0 win and leave Tormenta just two points behind Madison going into the final weekend of the regular season.
To make the playoffs, Tormenta needs a win against Charlotte on Saturday and Madison to lose or tie against Omaha. If Madison ties and Tormenta wins, the two teams would be tied in points and South Georgia has the tiebreaker by virtue of having more wins on the season.
Both Omaha and Charlotte will have something on the line Saturday so neither is likely to rest players. Omaha will be looking to clinch the Players’ Shield as the team with the best regular season record and top seed in the playoffs while Charlotte will need a win to secure the fourth seed and a first round home game in the postseason.
“We’re going to represent ourselves against Charlotte and if that’s our last game of the season that we play, then we want to win it and we hope that, with a win, we give ourselves a chance to play again,” Cameron said. “So it’s about how we respond. It’s about character and integrity in these moments and coming back to work and learning from tonight and getting better.”
