Pedro Ribeiro had two goals and Coastal Carolina beat the Elon Phoenix for the second straight year in the NCAA Tournament with a 3-0 win on Thursday night in Conway. The Chanticleers advance to the second round for a Sunday matchup at Wake Forest. Ribeiro broke a scoreless tie in the 42 minute to give CCU a 1-0 lead at the half. Ribeiro tallied his second goal in the 58th minute. Matt Risher closed out the scoring for Coastal, which improved to 19-2-2 on the season.
Post-game quotes from GoCCUSports.com
Coastal Carolina head coach Shaun Docking:
“I was really, really proud of our guys tonight. We bounced back terrifically after Sunday’s (Big South) final that we lost. The guys really responded very, very well. I think one of our themes over the last week of practice since Sunday was to try and put two 45-minute periods together so that we don’t fade in the second half and I think we did that tonight. Elon has a fantastic team. The nation’s leading goal scorer Chris Thomas is extremely good. I thought Uchenna Uzo did a fantastic job on Chris tonight and it really helped propel our team to a great win and a shutout win, which was I think pretty impressive.”
Elon head coach Darren Powell:
“First off, I just want to congratulate Coastal Carolina on a great performance tonight, winning 3-0. They played very well and did a good job throughout the game. In particular, Pedro (Ribeiro) got two wonderful goals tonight for them. I thought our guys played quite well throughout the match. I thought it was a strange game at times, but our guys played very well. As a coaching staff, we’re extremely proud of the way they played. You saw at the end, when we’re trying to score that they gave everything they could tonight, which they’ve done all year. I think that speaks volumes about their character and what our team’s about as well. I couldn’t be more proud of Elon, but I congratulate Coastal and wish them all the best moving forward in the tournament.”
