Brien Chamney hadn’t scored a goal all season and Wednesday would’ve been the perfect time. Syracuse led 1-0 near the end of the first half, and another score could’ve secured a key victory and kept the Orange’s postseason hopes alive for at least one more game.

Four Syracuse players, including Chamney, bunched together near the net as a free kick soared high into the air from around midfield. Everyone jumped, but it appeared too high – possibly sailing toward the goalkeeper. At the last instant, Chamney put his head on the ball and deflected it into the net behind him. No one celebrated, though, at least on the Orange sideline.

It was an own goal. Chamney’s act of misfortune had just tied the game at 1-1 and sucked the wind out of an Orange team fighting for its life.

Chamney’s own goal in the 38th minute propelled St. John’s to a 3-1 victory over Syracuse Wednesday, eliminating for the second straight year the Orange’s chances of reaching the Big East Tournament. Though the mistake didn’t directly cost Syracuse the game, it clearly deflated a team that carried the momentum until that point.

‘Nobody said a word to me after it,’ Chamney said. ‘I don’t know, I didn’t even look at anybody else. I just wanted to keep playing and try to get it back. It feels really bad, but I had to be mentally tough.’

The play started innocently when Syracuse forward Hansen Woodruff fouled a St. John’s player around midfield, resulting in a long free kick by SJU’s Joel Gustafsson. He sent the ball toward the goal where four Orange defensemen and one Red Storm forward were waiting.

Senior captain Brad Peetoom, goalkeeper Rob Cavicchia and Chamney were trying to communicate as the ball was in the air, and the former two expected Chamney to easily clear it away. But no one took into account the strong wind whipping around SU Soccer Stadium at Gustafsson’s back, and the ball soared several feet further than anyone expected.

When Chamney jumped, he bumped into one of his teammates, causing him to mishit the ball as it flew by and put the side of his head on the ball, not the top. It was enough to send the ball the opposite direction Cavicchia was running. If Chamney hadn’t touched the ball, it may have rolled harmlessly to the keeper.

‘They had the wind, and it got carried a little further than we thought,’ Peetoom said. ‘There was a little miscommunication, and Chamney had nowhere else to go with it. In the end, we gotta clear that ball, and it didn’t happen.’

A few minutes before the own goal, the Red Storm failed to connect on a possible scoring opportunity when Alexandre Ivo missed an open goal with a shot wide right. But for most of the first half, Syracuse seemed in control of the game and held a 1-0 lead on Kyle Hall’s goal off a free kick in the 27th minute.

After the own goal, though, everything changed.

With time winding down in the first half, the Red Storm almost took the lead, but the shot banged off the crossbar. After the break, St. John’s came out firing on all cylinders, scoring the second and eventual game-winner just four minutes into the second half.

Although the Orange had almost an hour of soccer left to play after the own goal, it never really recovered, and the play’s importance wasn’t lost on Syracuse head coach Dean Foti.

‘I think that certainly might’ve been an important turning point,’ Foti said. ‘I don’t think that we handled ourselves well after that point. We really kinda lost our focus.’

After the match, Chamney appeared sheepish and embarrassed, knowing his mistake contributed to Syracuse’s season ending prematurely. It was a disappointing end to a campaign that had started promising, when the Orange was 4-0-3.

Foti acknowledged it was just a mistake – an unlucky play that hurt his squad. Still, it was a play that will leave Syracuse wishing it still had something to play for.

‘He’s not trying to do that, and it’s one of those things that sometimes happens,’ Foti said. ‘It couldn’t have happened at a worst time, but you know what? You get the ball out of the net, and you keep playing. It wasn’t like that was the winning goal or anything.’

Published on October 31, 2007 at 12:00 pm