VANCOUVER – The UBC Thunderbirds suffered their first loss of the Canada West men's soccer season, falling 2-0 Sunday in Kelowna against the UBC Okanagan Heat.
 
Third-year defender Aaron Mulama and rookie midfielder Jacob York both scored for the first time in their respective Canada West careers. 
 
The Thunderbirds, ranked fifth in U SPORTS, outshot the hosts 23-6, but couldn't solve Heat goalkeeper Nicholas Reitsma, who made a career-high nine saves for his first shutout of the season.
 
"We are all massively disappointed with the result today and over the weekend," said UBC head coach Mike Mosher. "But, the effort from the group was good, we just did not generate enough quality chances from the vast amount of possession we had. And credit to both opponent teams and coaches as they executed on their intentions with good counters and strong resolve on the back end. This is also the beauty of Canada West where there are no easy games and any team can take points from anyone in our league. The season is still young and we have many games left to right the ship, and we will get back to work to improve in the areas we need to address and get better."

The Heat opened the scoring in the ninth minute as Mulama flew down the left side and guided the ball into the net. After getting a pass from Jimmy Steel, Mulama quickly separated himself from a UBC defender and found the bottom right side of the goal.

The Heat carried the 1-0 lead into the second half, although the stats were heavily in favour of the Thunderbirds, who lead in shots 13-4 at the break.
 

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UBC continued to press early in the second half and came close to scoring in the 49th minute when Kerman Pannu played a ball into the box and had it tip off Reitsma's fingertips, rattling the goalpost. 

York buried the Heat's second of the game in the 66th minute. He deflected a pass from Taylor Piche into the back of the net.

UBC (2-1-1) has a bye week before returning to action on Sept. 14 at home against Lethbridge.

- with files from Brandon Smith (UBC Okanagan Sports Information)