The Harvard men's soccer team outshot St. Francis Sunday, but couldn't find a goal in a 1-0 loss in its final game before Ivy play begins.

The Harvard men’s soccer team played 80 minutes of hard-fought scoreless soccer, but its fate had already been decided.

Nine minutes into Sunday afternoon’s matchup against St. Francis (5-2-1), the Crimson (1-5-2) let in the only goal of the game and fell at Ohiri field in its final match before the start of Ivy League play.

Harvard attacked early and won its first corner kick of the game less than two minutes in. Senior defender Ross Friedman connected with sophomore defender Mark Ashby in the box, but Ashby’s header went wide. The Crimson possessed the ball and held the Terriers to zero shots in the first eight minutes, but a corner kick in the ninth minute would be Harvard’s undoing.

While the Crimson was unable to capitalize on its early set piece, St. Francis seized its first opportunity. Senior defender Riccardo Milano tracked down a corner kick by senior midfielder John Johansson and headed it into the lower left corner of the net for his first goal of the season.

Down early in the first half, Harvard came back firing with three opportunities—including two shots by sophomore forward Oliver White—in the next ten minutes.

“I think the key for us is always to regroup after a goal against us, to get together and talk through what went wrong and fix it going forward, and to make sure we have the mentality of attack,” senior midfielder Kevin Harrington said. “You’ve got to play like it’s 0-0 and the game is still yours.”

The Crimson’s effort would not be enough, as it was scoreless in its second straight game and for the fourth time eight games. Of Harvard’s 12 shots, only four were on target, and Terriers Junior goalkeeper Jack Binks made the four saves to preserve his second consecutive complete-game shutout.

Harrington led the Crimson with four shots—including two on goal—for his highest total of the season. Harvard outshot St. Francis in the second half, eight to seven, but was unable to find the back of the net despite a number of close calls.

“If we finish two of those chances, the result changes today,” Crimson coach Pieter Lehrer said. “Look at any of those games where we have six or seven chances in the six [yard line]. If those get finished, we’ve won two or three of those [games]. I think they know how close they are, and its frustrating not to have turned the corner yet, but we’ll keep going at it.”

As shot after shot went wide, Harvard continued to dominate the possession game, playing the majority of the second half in the Terriers’ territory. The Crimson’s best chance of the period came 30 minutes in, when freshman forward Daniel Smith headed the ball towards a gap in the St. Francis defense. Though Binks could not get there in time to make the save, the ball ricocheted off the right post and out of bounds.

Despite being unable to covert on offense, Harvard’s strong defensive performance kept its deficit at one. Senior Brett Conrad and sophomore Evan Mendez split time in goal for the Crimson and combined for seven saves.

After starting the previous two games, Mendez came in at the half and put up his second straight shutout performance. He made two quick saves within five minutes of entering the game, including a free kick by Terriers junior forward Kevin Correa that made it over Harvard’s defensive wall. Mendez was able to get a hand on the high shot and tip it over the crossbar for a St. Francis corner kick.

Twenty minutes later Mendez made another acrobatic save, diving far to his right to deflect a Terriers header out of bounds with one hand.

“All you can ask for is an opportunity to win the game, and we had that today,” Harrington said. “We didn’t quite capitalize on it, but you have to take the positives out. We played good enough defense to keep them to only one goal, and we could come out with a win if we could get those opportunities in.”

The Crimson’s losing record in the non-conference heavy portion of its season will not preclude the team from a shot at the Ivy League title, but Harvard is looking to learn from its early losses to reverse the trend.

“From here on out, we can no longer have these losses,” Harrington said. “We’ve got to finish off our chances and keep pushing forward and putting the ball in the back of the net.”

--Staff writer Hope Schwartz can be reached at Hschwartz@live.com.