Spartanburg, S.C.— The USC Upstate Men's soccer team will be back in action at County University Soccer Stadium Tuesday night against the Mercer Bears.
 
USC Upstate (1-4-0) and Mercer (4-2-0) will face off for the seventh time in program history on Tuesday, September 24th. The Spartans will look to improve on their last matchup against the Bears in 2018 that ended in heartbreak as Mercer scored the game-winning goal in the last 10 minutes of the match to give themselves a 3-2 victory over the Spartans. Mercer leads the all-time series over the USC Upstate at 4-1-1. 
 
USC Upstate is coming off a 4-1 loss to the Furman Paladins on Saturday evening. The Spartans were down 3-0 at one point in the match but continued to fight back and were able to record a goal that came from a beautiful header scored by Joel Bunting, his first of the season. This goal by Bunting sparked life into the Spartan attack as this led to five shots in the final 20 minutes of the match. The Spartans ended the game with momentum on their attacking side and will look to continue this effort against the Bears. 
 
Felipe Baeza (Santiago, Chile) got the nod from coach Scott Halkett and continued to stand strong in goal as he recorded three saves in this match, adding to his total of 11 saves this season. Mario Arrocha was able to capitalize on a corner kick rewarding him his first assist of the season. Bunting is now in a 3-way tie for most goals on the team with Robert Umana and Moss Lewis. 
 
Mercer is 4-2 on the season after losing two straight OT games to South Carolina and Jacksonville University. The Mercer Bears started their season strong with wins over Cincinnati, Presbyterian College, UAB and Memphis. The Bears top goal scorer is Trevor Martineau who has netted 3 goals for the bears and also has 4 assists on the season. 
 
In goal for the Bears is JR DeRose who has started all games for the Mercer Bears and has allowed 6 goals and has recorded 19 saves. The Mercer Bears are coached by Brad Ruzzo in his 11^th season as the head coach. 
 
USC Upstate and Mercer will kick things off tomorrow at 7:00 p.m. at County University Soccer Stadium. Links to the live stats and video stream of the game can be found at www.upstatespartans.com.
 
 Follow USC Upstate men's soccer on Facebook (UpstateAthletics), Twitter (@UpstateMSoccer), Instagram (@upstatespartans) and YouTube (USCUpstateAthletics).