In a highly contested and hard-fought battle, the Brock Badgers men's soccer team defeated the visiting McMaster Marauders 3-1 in the Ontario University Athletics (OUA) quarter-finals on Saturday, Oct. 28.
"We're ecstatic. We started well when we went up 2-0," said head coach Aleks Balta. "Credit to all the guys and the ones who stepped onto the field later on. They made a huge impact as a unit and we fought through it and got the win."
The first half saw the Badgers strike early as sophomore forward Luca Danesi put the ball past McMaster goalkeeper Ethan Cagalj off a nifty through ball from defender Connor Carroll.
Mere minutes later, Brock struck again as Badgers' scoring leader Marc Iantomasi put in a ball past a scrambling McMaster defence. Michael Fernandez helped set up that play with his first attempt, causing Cagalj to come out of the net to try to make a play.
Amir Shirazi earned one back for the Marauders in the 29th minute. The Badgers held a 2-1 lead heading into halftime.
McMaster continued to pressure as they looked for the equalizer. Brock got into some yellow card trouble, giving up two (Noah DeDominicis and Nicholas Esperanca) within the first 20 minutes of the second half.
The Marauders kept pressing with multiple corner kick opportunities late in the contest. Goalkeeper Taylor Miskolczi made some key saves in the latter stages to preserve the Badgers' lead.
Third-year striker Michael Solomon sealed the win with a third goal for Brock as the kinesiology major blasted the ball just under the bar, producing the loudest cheers of the evening from the Badgers' faithful.
As the final whistle blew, the players celebrated a monumental victory, accomplishing a feat that hasn't been done by the men's soccer program in 17 years.
Balta looks forward to the opportunity for his team to travel to Ottawa for an epic semifinal clash with the No. 4 Carleton Ravens on Wednesday, Nov. 1.
"It's going to be a huge challenge, but if you want to earn your right to nationals, you got to beat teams like Carleton."
Up next, the Badgers will travel to Ottawa to take on the No. 4 Carleton Ravens on Wednesday, Nov 1 for the OUA semifinals. Kick-off is set for 6:30 p.m.
The winner of the contest will book their ticket to the U SPORTS Championship (Nov. 9-12) at Cape Breton University in Sydney, NS.
Livestream the match on OUA.tv.
