Sacramento State men’s soccer (0-2-1) lost their second game of the season to the Loyola Marymount (1-1-2) at home on Sunday.

Three different Lions scored against the Hornets in the first half alone.

The first LMU goal came in the fifth minute when defender Griffin Bell converted a Hornet turnover into a goal. Bell was assisted by Adrien Perez and shot the ball into the top right corner of the net from about ten yards out.

The second LMU goal came in the 35th minute after midfielder Sebastian De Rada scored his first goal of the season by connecting in the near post of the goal. Alvaro Madrigal and David Flores helped assist the goal by working the ball inside the box and drawing attention away from De Rada.

Four minutes later, the Lions made the score 3-0 when freshman forward Grant Sampson finished a shot into the far post of the goal from ten yards away.

Heading into halftime the Hornets were down three goals.

Hornet’s head coach Michael Linenberger told his players at halftime he was proud of them, despite the 3-0 deficit.

“You know it sounds strange but I was quite pleased with the way we played today,” Linenberger stated. “I thought we played a lot better than we did on Friday. Obviously the result is a lot worse than on Friday.”

LMU had a clear advantage over the Hornets in shots on target. The Lions had five shots on target and converted three of them. The Hornets had only two shots on goal and were not able to finish.

Hornet’s goalkeeper Phillip Bru was constantly under pressure and made two saves during the game. Bru kept encouraging his teammates to not give up.

“We played our best soccer of the year thus far, we just didn’t finish,” Bru said. “They [LMU] finished their chances. They got pretty lucky on a couple goals, but I thought the soccer today was good and I thought the fight this weekend was great.”

After the game, senior captain Andres Garcia talked about how proud he was of his team and some of the young players who stepped up.

“We definitely need to just work on our finishing,” Garcia said. “I’m proud of my boys, we kept fighting until the end and it’s still a long season. It’s tough, but you always got to keep your head up and push forward.”

After playing two tough matches against San Diego and LMU this weekend, the Hornets will be hosting San Jose State on Sept. 12 at 4 p.m.