Chico State Men’s Soccer, sitting at (6-3-6) and (3-1-4) in conference play, traveled south this past weekend to take on the San Marcos Cougars and the San Bernardino Coyotes.

The Wildcats were coming off a home win against the Stanislaus State Warriors, and they wanted to be aggressive and take an early lead vs the Cougars on Friday.

“We want to put pressure on defenses,” said sophomore Justin Ricketts. “Take shots early on and test their defense.”

Neither team was able to take an early lead as after the first 45 minutes, they went into the half tied with only nine combined shots for each team.

Three minutes into the second half, a goal from Oliver Reader put San Marcos up by one, causing Chico to play from behind.

It wasn’t until late in the 86th minute when a pass from Preston Moll led to a goal by Justin Ricketts, his first career collegiate goal. It couldn’t have come at a better time for the Wildcats.

“It was a major sense of relief,” Ricketts said. “It equalized the game and was my first goal so it really was just a huge moment for me and the team.”

The Wildcats’ refusal to quit this season has been one of the main components of their current 5th-place ranking in the California Collegiate Athletic Association standings. They are sitting two points ahead of the sixth place San Marcos and four from being out of the playoffs all together.

Defender Dawson White is aware of the resilience this team shows.

 “This game says a ton about our team, it’s not easy to come back but as a team we are not willing to give up. When we come together it just shows what we can do,” White said.

The Wildcats traveled down to San Bernardino to take on the Coyotes on Sunday Oct. 16.

It was a rough day for the Wildcats as they only managed to get two shots off the whole game compared to the Coyotes’ 11. 

However, due to their defense and play of goalkeeper Luis Albarran, they denied three of those 11 shots and were able to keep the Coyotes off the score sheet as they tied another point to their total, bringing it up to 13.

Chico State comes home this weekend for an important two-game stretch where they will take on Cal State Dominguez Hill on Friday at 4:30 p.m. and Cal State Monterey Bay on Sunday at 11:30 a.m.

Dominguez Hill sits at number one currently on the CCAA table and Monterey is just one spot ahead of the Wildcats at number four.

Jackson Elrod can be reached at [email protected] or @jacksonelrod13 on Twitter.