Box Score

Photo by Peyton Thibault

Houston, TX— The Occidental men's soccer team's historic season continued with a vintage comeback performance from the Tigers. Oxy faced off against the University of St. Thomas (TX) Celts in the first round of the NCAA Division III Championships on Saturday night. 

The game would start off slow for the Tigers despite putting together good offensive possession and creating shots on goal. Both Ethan Carr and Oury Diane had early shots that forced the Celt goalie to come up with nice saves to keep the game scoreless.

After Andrew Notter had a nice shot on goal that needed to be saved by the goalie and with only about 10 minutes to go in the first half, St. Thomas (TX) would get on the board with a goal on their first shot on goal all game. 

Down 1-0, the Tigers would remain calm and composed as they have all year, trusting in each other and knowing that every player on the field would give their all until the game had reached its end. The game would go into the half at that score but would not remain that way for long into the second half. 

Oxy came out strong with a shot from Oury Diane that was almost the equalizer but was saved by the goalie. With about 10 minutes gone by in the half, Joey Schwartz put a solid shot on a penalty kick that was deflected by the goalie out of bounds. On the ensuing corner kick, Schwartz made the perfect pass to Christian Corcoran who deposited the ball into the goal to tie the game at 1-1. 

Both teams would have limited opportunities to score for the remainder of the game as both teams' defensive intensity increased with the game on the line. As the clock ticked closer to the end of regulation, both teams were giving it their all looking for the game winning goal. Oxy's Riley Nyhan would come up with two big saves back to back with only 10 minutes left in the game. 

Nyhan came up with another big save in the 84th minute of the game before St. Thomas got off two more shots that sailed out right and out top. With less than a minute and thirty seconds left in regulation Oxy was making a push on offense as Oury Diane took the ball down the field and into the penalty box. 

After the ball was deflected around, Diane found the ball back in his possession with a look at the goal. Diane fired up and took the shot that would sail past the goalie and into the back of the net and give Oxy the 2-1 lead that would hold for the rest of the game. 

With Diane's clutch goal, Oxy advances to the second round of the NCAA Division III Championships against Trinity (TX) tonight at 7pm CST/5pm PST. Stats and live stream can be found on Oxy's schedule page.