STATESBORO, Ga. - Florida Gulf Coast tallied a goal in each half and held off a furious second-half charge to notch a 2-0 men's college soccer victory over host Georgia Southern on Friday evening at Eagle Field.

The FGCU Eagles improved to 2-2 on the season with the win, while the GS Eagles suffered their first defeat of the season, falling to 2-1-1. It was the first meeting in school history between the two teams. Georgia Southern returns to action on Tuesday, September 11, traveling to top-ranked Wake Forest for a 7 p.m. showdown in Winston-Salem, N.C.

The visitors did not take many shots in the first half, but made them count as Florida Gulf Coast had three shots - all on goal - before halftime. Freshman goalkeeper Jokull Blaengsson made a pair of nifty saves, including a reflex one-handed stop of a shot from Shak Adams in the 16th minute.

FGCU broke through in the 35th minute on a corner kick from Kareem Riley that Blaengsson got his hands on, but it deflected to the far post, where Kamar Marriott volleyed it in for the match's first goal.

Georgia Southern held a slim 4-3 edge in shots at halftime, but none of the homestanding Eagles' shots were on goal.

That changed early in the second half as Georgia Southern pressed to find an equalizer. A sequence just a minute and a half into the period saw Eirik Hoydal, Aldair Cortes and Samuel Mayer all test FGCU keeper Gustavo Vasconcelos, but each time Vasconcelos came up with the save.

In all, Vasconcelos came up with five second-half saves to preserve the shutout for the visitors, helping FGCU withstand what would be a 14-3 second-half edge in shots. 

The visiting Eagles would clinch the match in the 58th minute as Preston Kilwein's service from the left side found the head of Joao Burti, who beat Blaengsson to the right for the final 2-0 margin.

"The game was won and lost in both penalty boxes," Georgia Southern Head Coach John Murphy said. "I thought we started brightly, we created some good chances from our pressure, which I thought was quite good. They settled in, they moved the ball well; they're very athletic and mobile. I thought we just lacked that cutting edge. Jokull [Blaengsson] made a fantastic save to keep it nil-nil, and unfortunately there was an error that lead to the first goal. That's going to happen, throughout a season, but I don't expect it to happen too often. If you take the mistake out of it, the first half was even. 

"In the second half, now we're pushing on, looking for the equalizer and we're vulnerable. They go and score the second. They're built for it, I think they're very well coached. and it was a very good performance from them. But that's as fragmented as I've ever seen us at home. We have lots to work on, and not a lot of time since we're going to be going to [#1-ranked] Wake Forest on Tuesday."

Shots finished in favor of Georgia Southern, 17-7, and corner kicks were even at four apiece. Florida Gulf Coast was whistled for 14 fouls, compared to 10 for Georgia Southern, and FGCU was offsides three times on the night, while GS was offsides once.