Sept. 29, 2002

Box Score

DENVER - The University of Denver men's soccer team, playing in the last game of the Denver Classic, got two goals from senior Robert Rice (Kingwood, Texas) in the 44th minute and 65th minute of play today at Pioneer Field, lifting the Pioneers to a spirited, 2-0, victory over St. Mary's College. With the win, Denver improves to 6-4-0. SMC drops to 2-6-2.

After a scoreless 43 minutes, the Pioneers were the first ones on the scoreboard as Rice redirected a Nat Borchers (Pueblo, Colo.) shot and beat St. Mary's goalkeeper Aaron Valdez with the redirection that gave Denver a 1-0 lead at halftime.

The Pioneers added another goal in the 65th minute when Rice took a pass off a cross from teammate Nic Hartman (Littleton, Colo.) and scored his second goal of the day that gave Denver a 2-0 lead. The two teams played scoreless the rest of regulation.

Lami Harmon (Newark, Del.) recorded two saves for Denver as he recorded is first career shutout, along with the Pioneers first shutout of the season. This is the Pioneers' second two-game winning streak. They opened the season 2-0.

"I am so proud of this team for the weekend we had," head coach Chad Ashton said. "Our guys never quit the whole weekend and just kept battling. When we got down two goals in the first half of Friday's game, we didn't panic and knew what we needed to do."

The day's first game saw Air Force beat UMKC, 2-1, in a come-from-behind victory. For the Falcons, Marcus Sagastume and Colin Eames recorded the goals.

Goals by Period       1  2   Tot-------------------------------St. Mary's College..  0  0 -  0DEN.................  1  1 -  2
SCORING SUMMARY:GOAL   Time Team     ## Goal Scorer              Assists---------------------------------------------------------------------------------1.   44:49 DEN      22 RICE, Robert (4)         9 BORCHERS, Nat2.   65:52 DEN      22 RICE, Robert (5)         15 HARTMAN, Nic
Shots by Period       1  2    Tot               Saves by Period       1  2  Tot-------------------------------------          -------------------------------------St. Mary's College..  5  6 - 11                St. Mary's College..  4  3 -  7DEN................. 14  7 - 21                DEN.................  2  0 -  2