The St. Louis Ambush lost a hard-fought 6-5 battle to the Kansas City Comets Saturday night at the Cable-Dahmer Arena in Independence. The win improved Kansas City’s season record to 6-4-4, while the Ambush dropped to 4-7-1.
St. Louis scored first when Kansas City goalkeeper Nicolau Neto was down after having just made a save, but the ball found Lucas Almeida, who put it away in the eighth minute of the first quarter. The equalizer from the Comets came in the twelfth minute when Lucas Sousa sent a shot at Ambush goalkeeper Paulo Nascimento, who blocked the shot but it hit the post and went into the net. At the buzzer, the opening period ended with the score knotted at 1-1.
Almeida nailed his second of the match when Neto attempted to kick the ball out of the penalty area but Almeida was a little too close and was able to get a solid foot on the ball and pound it on target in the fourth minute of the second period. Neither team found the back of the net for the remainder of the first half, giving the visitors a 2-1 lead at halftime.
The third quarter would see three consecutive goals from each team. The Comets scored the equalizer in the fourth minute when a shot by Ray Lee came off the board and found the foot of Milos Vucic, who put it in the net. Kansas City took their first lead of the contest in the fifth minute when Lee scored on a restart off a pass from Ignaico Flores. Three minutes later, the Comets increased their lead to 4-2 on Sousa’s second goal of the game. St. Louis answered in the tenth minute when Pepe Junqueira took a pass from Marcel Berry and scored from the corner to make it a 4-3 game. Just over a minute later, the Ambush drew even when Duduca Carvalho put a shot into the side net of the goal. St. Louis regained the lead when a shot by Will Eskay threaded the needle through Comets defenders and into the net in the thirteenth minute. The buzzer signaled the end of the third stanza with the visitors clutching a 5-4 lead.
The back and forth continued in the fourth minute of the fourth quarter as Kansas City tied the game again when Junior Kazeem, stationed in front of the goal mouth, scored off a pass from Mike Da Silva. In a contoversial play, Kansas City player/coach Leo Gibson threw Nascimento to the turf then pushed him but the officials made no penalty call. The Ambush threw the challenge flag but after the video review, no penalty was assessed. The Comets took the lead when Nascimento made a save but Kazeem was able to get a shot on the loose ball and score with 37.8 seconds left on the clock to seal the fate of the Ambush and bring home the 6-5 winner for Kansas City.
After two weekends on the road, the Ambush return to the friendly turf of The Family Arena when they play back-to-back home games next weekend. The Milwaukee Wave come to town on Friday, February 10 at 7:35 p.m. CST, followed by a visit from the Florida Tropics on February 11 at 7:05 p.m. CST. All Ambush games are available for webcast at twitch.com.
Tickets for all Ambush home games are available from the Family Arena box office and ticketmaster.com. For season or group tickets, call the Ambush office at 636-477-6363.
