CRAWFORDSVILLE, Ind. - The Allegheny men's soccer team was unable to secure its first North Coast Athletic Conference victory of the season after falling 2-0 at Wabash.

In a physical contest that featured 33 fouls between the two squads, the Little Giants (8-2, 2-0 NCAC) thwarted a late Allegheny (3-7, 0-2 NCAC) surge with a goal in the final minute to put the game away.

The Little Giants owned an 18-7 margin in shots for the game, with Allegheny senior keeper David Stekla making four saves.

Wabash came out of the gates strong, forcing Stekla to make his first save of the game just 80 seconds into play.  The Little Giants would post five shots and four corner kicks in the first 16 minutes of action, but the Gator defense held strong,

Play would then even out, as the Gators posted two shots and a corner kick between the 17th and 28th minutes, before Wabash would score the game's first marker.  With 15 minutes left in the half, Stekla knocked away a blast from Stojan Krsteski, but Krsteski quickly pounced on the rebound and buried it to take a 1-0 lead.

The Little Giants would continue to have the better of the possession over the latter stages of the half, putting forth four more shots in the final 12 minutes, but two went wide and two more were blocked as the margin remained one goal at the intermission.

Wabash opened the second half in much of the same way as the first, as Stekla made his third save of the game just over three minutes into the half.  Five minutes later, the Gators again were able to avoid a two-goal deficit as a Wabash shot from outside the box banged off the crossbar.  

The play would then open up, featuring back-and-forth action primarily in the middle third of the field over the next several minutes  The Gators' Tolossa Hassan had a strong scoring chance with 15 minutes left, but was saved in close by Wabash keeper Dimitri Lee.  After Hassan's effort, the Gators managed to maintain possession for a long spell, and ive minutes later, Lee made another save, this time on a shot from Izaak Miller, to preserve the shutout.  

In the 88th minute, the Gators received their final big scoring chance when they were granted their second corner kick of the half.  Bryce Evans' arching kick went into traffic in front, but was cleared away by the Wabash defense, and the clearance led to Justin Kopp's insurance marker with 1:13 left on the clock.

Miller tied for game-high honors with three shots for the Gators, while Evans was credited with two.  Lee finished with two saves in goal to record the clean sheet for Wabash, which extended its winning streak to six games.

The Gators will now have a six-day respite before returning to action on Saturday, Oct. 7, when they travel to Delaware, Ohio to take on Ohio Wesleyan beginning at 5 p.m.