Monmouth men’s soccer cruised to a 3-1 victory over Villanova last Saturday at Hesse Field on The Great Lawn, . In doing so, the Hawks handed a Wildcats side ranked 25th in last week’s Top Drawer Soccer College Soccer National Rankings their first loss of the new season, after previously winning their first three.
“We’ve had some good moments [so far this season], but this is the best ninety minutes that we’ve put in for sure”, said Monmouth Head Coach Robert McCourt.
The opening seconds of the match would tell the story of what was to come after heavy pressure from Monmouth culminated in a hard cross into the area that was cleared by the Wildcats.
After a pair of half-chances were defended well by Villanova, a Monmouth corner was punched away by sophomore goalkeeper Will Steiner, but the ball ended up at the feet of freshman midfielder Anderson Asiedu, whose volley was sent wide. Nonetheless, all of the pressure came from the home side in the first ten minutes of the match.
The visitors finally had an opportunity to do some damage, but their free kick came right to junior goalkeeper Eric Klenofsky, who caught it with ease.
Following yet another wave of pressure from the Hawks, the Wildcats fought back. The visitors swung in a ball which was headed back towards a teammate near the eighteen, but the ensuing shot was weak and right into the hands of Klenofsky.
Monmouth had a staggering nine corners on the night.
In the 36th minute, Asiedu evaded a defender and shifted the ball onto his right foot. From the edge of the area, the Monmouth youngster struck the ball cleanly into the bottom left corner to put the Hawks in front. The Ghanian’s first ever goal at the collegiate level put the Hawks in front.
Less than ten minutes later, Villanova equalized. Junior midfielder Andreas Bartosinski collected the ball after a blocked shot ricocheted right towards him. He brought it down and smashed a shot into the back of the net beyond Klenofsky’s reach leveling the score going into the break.
“To be fair to them the guy scored a really nice goal, so sometimes you have to give credit to the goal scorer, but I just told them to continue doing what we’re doing and if we can put in the same effort in the first half, in the second half, then we’ll get what we deserve,” said McCourt.
Shortly into the second half Monmouth regained their advantage through a stunning free kick courtesy of junior midfielder Miguel Alves. The Hawks had a dead ball near the right corner of the eighteen-yard box. Alves stepped up with his left foot and swung it right around the wall and into the bottom right corner of the net.
Villanova searched for an answer, a sequence of two saves and multiple blocked shots from Klenofsky and the backline ensued.
Moments later, the Hawks put the game to bed. Senior midfielder John Egan maneuvered his way through the visitors’ defense before splitting a pair of defenders to find the path of sophomore midfielder Andrew Gee. Gee ran onto the ball and approached the touchline before shifting it onto his left foot and placing it into the far corner of the net. With less than 12 minutes left, the game was all but over.
The final whistle sounded with Monmouth taking all three points in a 3-1 win over Villanova. The Hawks improved their record to 2-3-0 while the Wildcats drop to 3-1-0.
“We just take them all as one game at a time. We don’t get too caught up in where we are down the road,” said McCourt. “We always focus on one game at a time, and the next game is Rutgers, so we’ll put this Villanova game away quickly and we’ll start focusing on Rutgers which is the next challenge.”
Monmouth will be taking on Rutgers at home tonight, kickoff is at 7 p.m. on ESPN3.
PHOTO COURTESY of Monmouth Athletics
