Soccer ends last road series with a win

Photo by Roxie Gonzalez

The Oklahoma Christian University men’s soccer team split a pair of games on the road on Oct. 25 against Newman University and Oct. 27 against Rogers State University.

After routing Newman each time in their last seven meetings, the Eagles recorded a 1-0 loss to the Jets.

“Our loss against Newman was a pretty tough loss,” sophomore Seth Brown said. “The effort was there but we just couldn’t find the back of the net.”

Newman outshot Oklahoma Christian 14-11, but Brown said an active defensive front kept the Eagles in the game.

“We had solid work from the defense to the forwards,” Brown said. “We just struggled to produce offensively. They also got a pretty lucky goal off an unfortunate mistake.”

Oklahoma Christian goalkeeper Evan Helker recorded four saves, but missed one in the 52nd minute after Newman’s Lucas Hanson assisted Kerbson Lubin for the game’s only goal.

After dropping the first three games in their four-game road series, the Eagles returned home with a 3-0 win over Rogers State.

“In the game against Rogers State we finally put it all together,” Brown said. “For the past three or so games we’ve had great effort and work on the field, but in each of the previous games we couldn’t score a goal.”

The Eagles were outscored 7-0 in the previous three games, but an offensive surge from defender Cody Cook carried the team against Rogers State.

“Finally at Rogers State we got two goals from Cody Cook, which was awesome,” Brown said. “From there we had the game more or less, but we still had to fight”

Cook’s first goal came in the 18th minute from 35 yards out off an assist from Ante Susic. In the 30th minute, Cook found the back of the net again on a free kick near the penalty box to put the Eagles ahead 2-0.

The score remained the same until the 73rd minute, when Cole Rinke sunk a shot 18 yards out. Oklahoma Christian defeated Newman 3-0 despite a lopsided 16-9 shot count in the Hillcat’s favor.

“It wasn’t necessarily a pretty win, but it was a good win,” Brown said. “So the team was really satisfied, especially coming off of some hard road games.”

Oklahoma Christian will host Texas-Permian Basin on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Lubbock Christian on Monday to conclude the season.