'WILLIAMSTOWN, MASS.  9/28/05 - The Keene State College men's soccer team suffered its first loss of the season, a tough 2-1 setback to Williams College in a battle of top ranked New England teams in Williamstown on Wednesday afternoon.

Ranked seventh nationally and number one in New England, the Owls drop to 8-1 while Williams ranked 18th in the national poll and third in the region, improves to 6-1.

Williams scored two first half goals.  Just 4:50 into the game, Josh Bolton sent a free kick from the right wing across the offensive box to Dana Leary on the far post. Leary used his great height advantage to head the ball past keeper Cal Mintz, who finished with 6 impressive saves on the day.

Less than 4 minutes later, Patrick Huffer forwarded a pass from midfield to streaking John Hillman, who took the ball into the offensive box with a defender on him and managed to fire a low-angle shot just inside the far post.

The Owls started to exert offensive pressure the rest of the 1st half, but weren't able to cut into the Eph's lead.

The second half was a different game for the Owls of Keene St. A strong majority of the final 45 minutes of the game were played on their offensive end of the field. But goalie Nick Armington was up to the challenge turning aside numerous Owl scoring chances.

In the 59th minute, Keene St. finally broke through scoring on a beautifully orchestrated goal. Kyle Wood (Manchester, Conn.) found himself to the right of the goal inside the box and crossed the ball to Mike Cooley (Northborough, Mass.). Cooley tapped the ball past a diving Armington to breathe new life into the game. It was Cooley's seventh goal of the season. Armington finished the game with 10 saves.

"I think we got outplayed in parts," said Williams Coach Michael Russo. "Getting two early goals almost hurt us because we turned on a switch and didn't play very well for the rest of the game. However, Keene St. is a very good team and were happy to come away with the win."

"You're never happy with a loss, but I thought we played tremendous," said KSC Coach Ron Butcher.  "It was a classic college soccer game. We had them pinned in their own end for a good portion of the second half, but their goalie came up big and we missed some chances."

KSC returns home for a LEC Homecoming game against Plymouth State on Saturday (2 p.m.)