INDIANAPOLIS - The IUPUI men's soccer team allowed goals in the early minutes of each half as the Jaguars dropped a home contest to Belmont on a scorching Central Indiana Tuesday afternoon (Sept. 20), 2-1. Redshirt freshman Josemir Gomez tallied his team-high fifth goal of the season in the second half, but IUPUI was unable to come all the way back against the Bruins. 

Michael Saunders scored both goals for Belmont (4-1-2), doing so in the third and 47th minutes of action. 

"The immediate reaction is disappointment, considering I felt that this was an opportunity for us to win," assistant coach Lewis Dunne said. "It was a game where I felt we had more than enough opportunities to score goals and create chances, but we let ourself down defensively at times and unfortunately made some mistakes that we've made in the past. Hopefully, we learn from today."

Neither side had broken much of a sweat before Saunders struck first, getting on the receiving end of a Jansen Wilson cross for his first score of the season. Saunders played a ball to Wilson before taking off on a back post run up the field. Wilson returned the favor, hitting a sliding Saunders in stride for the game's first tally. 

IUPUI (1-3-3) had chances in the first half, including a clean right-footed strike from Ethan Vermillion that Belmont keeper Nate Logan cast aside for his lone save of the day in the fifth minute. 

Saunders extended the Bruins' lead to 2-0 in the 47th minute when he settled a loose ball and blasted a shot past Lucas Morefield from 20 yards out for his second score of the year. Given a two-goal lead, Belmont opted to sit in defensively and allow the IUPUI attack to possess against heavy defensive numbers. The Jaguars finally broke through in the 64th minute when Gomez rifled a header past Logan from eight yards out. Freshman Edgar Correia initiated the play with a long corner kick to the back side in which Kade Tepe recentered the play for his first point of the season. 

IUPUI continued to fire away at Belmont, outshooting the guests by an 11-8 margin, but only getting two to frame. Lukas Hackaa had a game-high four shots while Gomez and Logan Finnegan had three each. 

Very few players were able to muster a full 90 minutes on an unseasonably warm day that saw temperatures creep towards 90 degrees. Teams also opted for hydration breaks during each half - a rare sight for a late September match in Central Indiana. Despite Tuesday's outcome, the arrow remains pointed up for a Jaguars team that will embark on a key stretch. 

"I feel good. It's encouraging (to see) the individual performances," Dunne said. "At times in games we look dangerous and at times we look solid. It's just finding that consistency that we're lacking at the moment. As I've said before, we're making mistakes that we've made previously and we're not really avoiding mistakes that are avoidable, so we have a bit of an Achilles heel at the moment that we're struggling to avoid certain types of errors. 

"If we can fix that, it's really encouraging. We need to start learning from games like today. If we can do that, I think the program and the team is going into a really positive direction going into conference play." 

IUPUI will be back to Horizon League games for its next three outings, beginning at Detroit Mercy on Saturday, Sept. 24 at 7:00 p.m. That contest will be broadcast on ESPN+.