Rhode Island FC Continues Winning Streak With Late Victory

The win kings

Rhode Island FC notched their third straight win – and fifth in six matches – over North Carolina FC in dramatic fashion tonight as they extended their lossless streak to seven straight matches.

Given that they had won only one single game in their previous 13 matches, they appear to be an entirely different club. Whether it was simply a matter of an expansion team taking time to gel, or the boys needing to get over their yips, Coach Khano Smith and RIFC have clearly turned quite a corner.

Rhode Island now stands in seventh place in the USL Championship’s Eastern Conference — well within the playoff race — and are tied with Memphis 901 FC as the fourth-highest scoring team in the entire league. 21 of their 32 league goals have come in those last seven matches.

Further, tonight marked the first time since June 22 that Rhode Island failed to score at least three goals. It is also worth mentioning that they have allowed 30 goals against in 20 matches, with 11 of those goals against coming in the last seven matches though that is a improvement.

Rhode Island FC are the sixth worst team in the league, defensively speaking. Despite all this, they still walked away with all three points tonight.

The first half started off difficult for Rhode Island FC, as they faced multiple shots from a determined North Carolina attack, one that ultimately broke through in the 30th minute when North Carolina midfielder Mikey Moldonado received a header from winger Evan Conway just outside the RIFC box, and blasted the shot home past RIFC goalkeeper Koke Vegas’ left side. Vegas seemed slow to react.

On the flip side, Rhode Island FC forwards Jojea Kwizera and JJ Williams continued to demonstrate their new-found confidence, and were nearly a part of multiple first-half goals. But RIFC went into the half down a goal for the first time in over a month.

The second half began with multiple missed chances by both sides –including a second long shot that narrowly missed from RIFC midfielder Clay Holstad – who’s good for one or two of those every match (and I always enjoy it). Finally, Rhode Island FC broke through in the 74th minute, as defender Grant Stoneman, who recently returned from injury, fired a long shot from beyond the box that careened off the crossbar above the leaping North Carolina FC goalkeeper Jake McGuire, and bounced right off the head of RIFC forward Mark Doyle, who blasted it into the open net.

With the score tied at 1-1, Rhode Island upped the urgency of their play and in the 84th minute RIFC winger Noah Fuson fired a through pass that snaked beyond the outstretched feet of the North Carolina defender to find fellow RIFC midfielder Zachary Herivaux – who just scored two goals in their last match against Birmingham Legion FC –who banged a shot off the crossbar and down into the net to give Rhode Island FC a 2-1 lead on the way to what is already the highest-scoring season in Herivaux’s career.

From there, they saw out their sixth victory of the season, and continued to grow their now-positive goal differential.

Rhode Island FC fans do have a lot to celebrate – the team seems to have turned a corner and are very much scoring for fun — averaging double the goals their opponents have scored. That said, they are allowing an average of 1.5 goals against per game and over the last seven matches they are allowing an average of 1.5 goals against per game. Though their scoring numbers are impressive, these defensive performances are worrying and now that the team is firing towards goal, Khano Smith’s next concern needs to be fixing the defense.

Will he start with the ongoing battle between goalkeepers Koke Vegas and Jackson Lee? Only time will tell.

Rhode Island FC are back in action on Saturday, August 3rd, at 4:00 pm ET, as they play away at Detroit City FC, who you may remember Rhode Island experienced their last loss to, 2-0 on June 8. The road trip continues with an away match on Wednesday, August 7th, at 7:00 pm ET against Indy Eleven.

Rhode Island FC returns home to Beirne Stadium in Smithfield, Rhode Island, to play their local rivals, Hartford Athletic, on Saturday, August 10, at 7:30 pm ET.