CLEVELAND, Ohio – The Vikings (3-5, 1-3) fell to the visiting Air Force Academy (7-4, 4-1) on Saturday by a final score of 12-9.
Cleveland State claimed the first lead of the game after Xander Johnson scored off a pass from Amiri Austin with 12:42 remaining. Air Force tied the score at one apiece with an unassisted goal at the 9:09 mark.
Brendan Sigurdson found the back of the net with 5:02 left in the first quarter to give the Green and White a 2-1 advantage.
The Falcons ran off four straight goals to open the second quarter, taking a 5-2 advantage with 8:13 remaining in the first half. Johnson halted the run with a goal off a feed from Sigurdson at the 7:28 mark.
Air Force extended their lead back to three goals with an unassisted goal with 5:49 showing on the clock. One minute later, Johnson completed his hat-trick off a pass from Gavin Held as the Green and White trailed 6-4.
Air Force scored three straight goals to start the third quarter, extending their advantage to 9-4 with 6:50 to go in the period.
Held notched the lone goal of the quarter for the Vikings off a feed from Andrew Boniface at the 1:57 mark. With two seconds to play in the quarter, Air Force struck again to lead 10-5.
The Vikings started the final quarter quickly with a goal in just 20 seconds as Grayson Dague scored off a Sigurdson assist. The Falcons answered back with two unanswered goals to claim their largest lead of the game, 12-6, with 9:25 remaining.
A man-up goal by Ryan Haigh off a pass from Gannon Matthews started a late rally for Cleveland State with 7:17 to go. At the 4:40 mark, Alex Van Voorhis tallied an unassisted goal to get within 12-8.
Parker Yearego netted his first collegiate goal with 33 seconds left as the Vikings dropped the ASUN game to Air Force, 12-9.
Johnson finished with his fourth hat-trick of the season and second straight and is now tied for the team lead with 14 goals.
Cameron Logan recorded eight saves and was tied with Robbie Brazanskas with three ground balls. Karson Burkey and Brazanskas each finished with two caused turnovers.
Cleveland State will hit the road for two straight games, starting with Mercer on Saturday, April 8 at noon.
