In their final non-conference match of the regular season, the Washington men’s soccer team extended its win streak to three as it defeated the Gonzaga Bulldogs 2-1 in front of a full house of nearly 3,000 fans.

Holding onto the ball proved challenging for both sides, though Washington dominated the attack with 19 shots against Gonzaga’s nine.

The Husky offense got off to an early start when freshman forward Casey McCool passed the ball to senior midfielder Raphael Cox, who scored with a 15-yard shot to the side of the net just over four minutes into the game.

Washington’s struggle with ball possession through much of the first half allowed the Bulldog offense to attack. Gonzaga found the equalizer it needed when junior Ben Funkhouser took a shot from the top of the box that got past Husky goalkeeper Stephen Fung.

Halftime was a turning point for the Huskies, who applied an immense amount of pressure to the Bulldog defense and goalkeeper and earned five corner kicks.

“If you look at the statistical numbers, you can see that we’ve picked up our game big-time in the second half,” said Washington coach Dean Wurzberger. “The things we weren’t able to do in the first half, like hang onto the ball, especially on our target half ... we did a much better job than in the front half, giving some of our other players the chance to move forward.”

This shift was evident when sophomore defender Taylor Mueller made a header straight into the net in the 69th minute of play, after a cross by Cox and junior defender Casey Cunningham.

Washington was able to preserve this lead with a switch in the goalkeeper position from Fung to junior Rylan Hawkins. Wurzeberger has yet to name an official starting goalkeeper for the season, and for now the two contenders will continue to share net time.

Though shots were continually taken, neither team capitalized and the game ended 2-1.

“All in all, I’m really pleased with the second half,” Wurzberger said. “We were kind of dead even at halftime. They are a very good attacking side and we knew we had to respect their attack. It was going to be our attack against their defense that was going to decide the game, and it did. I’m really pleased with the way the players reacted at halftime and seized control of the game.”

This was Washington’s final match before beginning conference play at home next weekend.

Reach reporter Sheena Nguyen at sports@dailyuw.com.