NCFC Qualifies for Playoffs After Home Game Against San Francisco

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Cary, NC – After a draw against the San Francisco Deltas at home this past weekend, North Carolina FC has qualified for the NASL Playoffs.

Final Home Game of the Season

The match between North Carolina FC and the San Francisco Deltas was aggressive for the entirety of the playtime on Saturday, October 21, 2017 at Sahlen’s Stadium at WakeMed Soccer Park. A strong offense proved to be a tough defense as neither team were able to score on one another for the first half hour of the game.

The drought finally ended right in the 30th minute as Austin Da Luz, running in and taking a huge cross from Dre Fortune. That gave Da Luz the momentum needed to get a shot in past San Fransisco’s goalkeeper Romuald Peiser.

This goal set a fire under both teams who started fighting harder and faster, even bringing in some aggressive tackles. Then, by the 68th minute, Pablo Dyego got a rebound off of NCFC’s goalkeeper Macklin Robinson and scored the Deltas’ first goal of the match, tying things up 1-1. Neither team was able to get another point in, although Fortune came very close and Peiser got in an incredible save. And so, as the clock ran out, the match ended in a draw.

“I think you’ve seen a little of our steel and grit tonight,” said head coach Colin Clarke. “There were a lot of hard-nosed tackles out there and a lot of competitiveness. It was probably a fair result, at the end of it. I’m pleased with what we put into it, I thought they worked very hard as they’ve done for the full season. It was a good game all around.”

Looking Forward to the Playoffs

NCFC’s final game of the season is against the Indy Eleven on Sunday, October 29, 2017 in Indianapolis. Currently, NCFC is the third-ranked team in the league.

This will be NCFC’s first time in the playoffs since 2012 when they played as the Carolina RailHawks. For now, the teams’ seeds have NCFC going up against the San Francisco Deltas again, with the winning team going up against the winner of Miami FC vs the New York Cosmos.

Story by staff reports. Photos by Rob Kinnan.