In one of the season’s most highly anticipated matches, Notre Dame men’s soccer couldn’t quite break through. Despite outshooting No. 3 Stanford by a 15-4 margin, the 23rd-ranked Irish dropped a 1-0 result at home on Saturday night. Notre Dame now stands at 1-1-3 overall with a 1-0-1 start to Atlantic Coast Conference play. Meanwhile, the 6-1-0 Cardinal have defeated 2023 College Cup finalists Clemson and Notre Dame on the road to begin their tenure as an ACC member.
The hotly contested match featured nine bookings and opened with an evenly matched first half. Both teams found free-kick opportunities early but did not generate much. The game’s first real chance arrived in the 16th minute when senior midfielder Bryce Boneau made a run and crossed to Matthew Roou. The senior forward’s header caught the top of the crossbar and ramped out of play, maintaining the scoreless tie.
Just six minutes later, Stanford deposited the night’s only goal. Will Reilly took an in-swinging corner kick, one of only two in the match for Stanford, from the left side. His service soared to the back post, where Jackson Kiil rose above his man and buried a header goal. Notre Dame nearly answered back within the next minute, but junior midfielder KK Baffour’s turning shot in traffic crashed into the goal’s side netting. Freshman goalkeeper Blake Kelly’s only save of the night would take the match into halftime with Stanford still ahead by a goal.
With the second half barely underway, the night changed drastically when Kiil received a second yellow card and headed to the showers early. Stanford, already having been outshot 5-3 in the first half, faced the prospect of playing the night’s final 44 minutes with only 10 men. In theory, the Irish took advantage of the situation, setting up seven corner kicks and peppering the Cardinal with 10 shots in the second half alone. But Stanford keeper Rowan Schnebly made two saves to shut out the Irish, who had scored at least one goal in each of their previous five games to start the season.
Testing a hunkered-down Stanford defense, Notre Dame nearly found an equalizer in the 52nd minute. A high-speed cross from sophomore forward Jack Flanagan barely missed the sliding effort of Roou, leaking harmlessly across the goal mouth. Flanagan would remain prominent in Irish chances across the following 10 minutes, but the Cardinal defended him and his services well. Roou also kept on the hunt, directing a strong header that Schnebly dove left to catch in the 68th minute.
Beyond the second half’s midway point, the ball scarcely departed Notre Dame’s attacking third, but the Irish never found the score sheet. Stanford clogged up most shooting lanes while defending the Irish tightly enough that most of their shots carried little threat. When the final whistle blew, Notre Dame had lost despite possessing the ball 60 percent of the time, taking nine corner kicks and firing 15 shots to Stanford’s four.
Up next, the Irish will dip back into non-conference action for a week and a half. They will host Chicago State on Friday at 7 p.m. before welcoming Detroit Mercy to Alumni Stadium for another 7 p.m. match next Tuesday. Notre Dame’s next foray into ACC action will bring Clemson, last year’s national champion, into South Bend for a nationally-televised match on Friday, Sept. 27.
