CONWAY, S.C. - The Georgia Southern men's soccer team dropped its 2018 season finale to Coastal Carolina on Friday evening by a 3-1 score in Conway, S.C. 

The Eagles (6-6-3, 2-1-1 SBC) will be the No. 2 seed in the upcoming 2018 Sun Belt Conference Tournament, hosted by Georgia Southern next week. Coastal Carolina improved to 9-5 overall and 2-2 in the league with the win. With one more league match still to play, the Eagles' semifinal opponent is still to be determined, but GS will play on Friday, November 9 at 7 p.m. at Eagle Field in its first action of the tournament. The 2018 Sun Belt Conference Tournament bracket will be released tomorrow evening from the league office.

Georgia Southern and Coastal Carolina played a scoreless first half, with the Chanticleers holding a 7-1 edge in shots. When the second half began, CCU struck quickly, getting a goal in the 49th minute from Yazeed Matthews to take a 1-0 lead.

Coastal Carolina then clinched the match by scoring twice in a one-minute stretch as Tsiki Ntsabeleng tallied both goals for the Chanticleers to make the score 3-0.

The Eagles pulled a goal back in the 76th minute as sophomore Aldair Cortes tallied his first goal of the season, from an assist by senior Sebastian Gregersen, but CCU finished off the scoring in the 81st minute with a second goal from Matthews.

"I thought we started well, getting into halftime at nil-nil," Georgia Southern Head Coach John Murphy said. "They had the run of play but I thought we were still dangerous on the break. In the second half, they stepped things up a notch and we just didn't match it. It's a disappointing result with a lot on the line, but I'm not going to make excuses. Coastal were very good on the day and deserved to win. It just goes to show you with only five teams in the league how close the margin for error is. But we still did enough on the season to earn the second seed, so we'll dust ourselves off, go back home to play in front of our home crowd on Friday night in the Sun Belt semifinals."

Coastal Carolina finished the match with a 16-3 edge in shots. Freshman Jokull Blaengsson made four saves in net for the Eagles, while substitute goalkeeper Lance DaSilva made one save in net for CCU. Georgia Southern had a 3-2 edge in corner kicks and the Eagles were whistled for 14 fouls, compared to seven for the Chanticleers. CCU was offsides four times on the evening and GS was offsides three times.