DULUTH, Minn. – The Gustavus men’s soccer team opened the conference season with a 6-1 win over the St. Scholastica Saints. With the win, the Gusties move to 4-2 overall and 1-0 in the conference.
“The MIAC opener is always a special date and a time where you’re hoping to make a statement and build some momentum,” said Head Coach Tudor Flintham “I’m glad we did that today. We weren’t perfect by any means. We still have a lot of things to clean up and I actually don’t think the first 10 minutes were great for us. But once we settled into things obviously the guys put together a really good performance.”
Gustavus initiated scoring at the 13 minute mark when Sam Just (So., Lakeville) connected on a pass to Ethan Miller (Fy., St. Cloud), Miller headed the ball to get the Gusties on the board. Ten minutes later, Trace Dobson (Sr., Sioux Falls S.D.) gave the Gusties a 2-0 edge with assists credited to Cole Schwartz (Jr., Jakarta, Indonesia) and Owen Johnson (So., Apple Valley).
St. Scholastica answered back with a goal to cut the deficit in half. Matthew Gibbons (Sr., Minneapolis) was quick to retaliate just a minute and a half later on a free kick that the Saints couldn’t respond to before closing out the first half with a 3-1 lead.
One minute into the second frame Miller notched his second goal of the day with a pass from Dobson and Schwartz tacked on another from the top of the 18 ten minutes later. Putting the game out of reach, Nick Katzman (Jr., Minneapolis) found the lower right corner of the net with assists going to Miller and Leo Spry (Sr., Bemidji) in the 6-1 final.
“One really enjoyable thing is that different guys keep stepping up in big moments, and our quality is spread across a lot of the squad and positions. Today it was Ethan Miller that really announced himself, two goals and an assist in your first MIAC game should give the lad a bunch of confidence moving forward.”
Wesley Sanders (Jr., Urbandale, Iowa) was credited with the win, only allowing one goal and making two saves.
The team is next in action when they host Carleton on Saturday at 12:30.