YORK, Pa.— After gaining some confidence with a midweek win over Washington College, Eastern University Men's Soccer used guts and guile to claim all three points in a critical MAC Commonwealth road test at York.
Haroon Husseini scored the only goal of the match in the 8oth minute, and
Ty Bleiler stopped a penalty kick in the 89th minute to preserve the win.
The Eagles (5-8-1, 1-2) came into the day needing to find some traction in the league. The squad and coaches felt they had learned something in the second half of the Messiah game and in grinding out a 2-0 win over Washington College on Wednesday. Both those games featured solid defensive structure and an opportunistic mindset in the counter-attack.
Throughout the opening hour today, the Eagles had that structure in place.
Around the hour mark, the game got a little bit open. While both teams had chances, the Spartans had the better ones. Bleiler saw six shots and made two saves in a four-minute stretch.
When the Eagles worked to slow the pace down, it looked as though a draw might be the best possible result. When
Manny Pak needed to be subbed out with injury in the 79th minute, Husseini came back on to the pitch.
Those fresh legs proved to be important after the Eagles blocked a shot at the other end. Joåo Tarabal flipped a ball wide, and
Evan Cope beat his mark up the sideline. The graduate student from Jacksonville came into today with 34 goals and only four assists in 63 career matches. He did the work and recognized that Husseini had joined him in the gut-busting move forward. After drawing the defense across, he slipped a pass into space that Husseini pushed across the line for his first goal this year and second of his career.
Up a goal, the Eagles had to hold off a furious push for a full 10 minutes.
The Spartans (6-4-5, 1-1-1) committed numbers forward and peppered the box with serves and restarts. Bleiler was excellent in grabbing what he could, but
Kade Seip and
Steven Fajardo also dealt with incredible traffic.
The York long throw put everyone under pressure throughout and that challenge got more intense as the hosts became more desperate. A long toss into the scoring area in the 89th minute turned into a penalty when Fajardo went to clear a ball and caught a foot of a York player on the way to a clearance.
While Eastern opponents had only converted 2-of-7 from the spot this year, the moment looked dire. Bleiler read the kick and parried it wide to keep Eastern up, but they still needed another 100 seconds of defending. The Spartans used all of the possible time and had a chance late, but the match ended when they fouled Bleiler on yet another cross.
Bleiler finished the match with seven saves.
While the Eagles still have a hill to climb to get back into the post-season picture, they have a foothold and three of four matches at home to finish the year. Eastern will host Stevenson on Wednesday.
