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After a quick throw-in, Nathan Opoku controlled the ball at the top right corner of the penalty box with Notre Dame defender Mo Williams draped across his back and another Fighting Irish defender rushing towards him. With two quick touches, Opoku escaped the pressure and used a burst of speed to move a few steps backwards toward the middle of the pitch.

As the Notre Dame defense converged on him, the left side of the pitch became wide open. Opoku threaded a pass in between four Fighting Irish defenders and into the open space. 

Streaking down the left wing, Giona Leibold received the pass on the run and smashed a first timer to the near post and past the keeper. Thanks to Opoku’s creativity, the Orange moved the ball from the sideline to the back of the net in just seven seconds. 

“I had a vision,” Opoku said. “There was a space behind. So when I got the ball. I just wanted to turn and hit it into the space. I didn’t really look if [Leibold] was there. So I just hit it in the space, and he was there.”

Spurred on by Opoku’s assist, No. 24 Syracuse (4-0-1, 1-0 Atlantic Coast) dominated No. 22 Notre Dame (1-2-1, 0-1 ACC) in a 1-0 win. The defending ACC champions and NCAA semifinalists from a year ago managed just three shots while Opoku had six himself, including four on target. 

Williams, a 6’2” graduate transfer and last year’s Big East Tournament’s Most Outstanding Defensive Player, played physical defense on the 6-foot Opoku all match long. Opoku admitted Williams’ physicality was frustrating, but he used his own strength to get in threatening positions time and time again.

“Nate was an outlet for us,” head coach Ian McIntyre said. “On a hot day we asked our front three, two with with an attacking midfield player, to put a lot of pressure on them to try to stop. We knew that it could get quite direct at times.”

Opoku was a constant presence in the Notre Dame penalty box and led all players with six shots. In the 13th minute, Opoku received the ball in the box, but his defender pushed him wide and his attempt was easily saved by Notre Dame keeper Bryan Dowd. Five minutes later, he nearly scored Syracuse’s first goal. He had ample space on the left wing in the box, but his effort clanged off the crossbar. 

Just a few short minutes after the goal, Opoku and Leibold collided heads in SU’s penalty box and both players were down for several minutes. After a 12-minute rest, Opoku returned to the game, but Leibold did not return and was seen after the match with gauze in his nose.

There were frequent loose balls in the box and Opoku got a touch on several, although he had multiple shots deflected by the scrum of defenders in front of goal. 

In the 57th minute, he got a sliding touch on the ball inside the six-yard box, but Josh Ramsey slid in and deflected the effort. Less than two minutes later, he got a free header, but his shot bounced right into Dowd’s arms. 

Opoku and the rest of the Orange squad suffocated Notre Dame on the ball all match. The Fighting Irish were pressured heavily struggled to generate much of anything against Syracuse’s backline. 

Because of the Orange’s heavy pressure at the top of the formation, Notre Dame had several stretches where they had great difficulty even getting the ball into the Syracuse half.

McIntyre credited the Orange’s depth for the squad’s constant pressure. Francesco Pagano, Lorenzo Boselli and Julius Rauch supported Opoku and striking mate Levonte Johnson at the top and midfielders Curt Calov and Camden Holbrook kept key players like Colin Biros fresh.

But it was Opoku who was the driving force for Syracuse all match. Even in the final minutes of the game, when scoring wasn’t his chief priority, Opoku used his physicality to seal out Williams and other defenders from the ball and waste time in the corner. In the 87th minute, after a strong run against Williams from midfield to the edge box, he casually flicked the ball to Biros on the left flank after four Notre Dame defenders surrounded him. Biros passed it back to Opoku, who unleashed yet another threatening long shot.

“We always want to press, we don’t want to give the open-ended chance to play,” Opoku said. “So we dictate the play – we always attack.”

Published on September 10, 2022 at 5:41 pm

Contact Connor: [email protected]