By: Kaitlyn Belile, Contributor
The men’s soccer team ended the season on a high note, winning their Battle of the Bridge matchup against Niagara for the first time since 2019. Despite two power outages at the Demske Sports Complex on Wednesday night, graduate student Luke Szablewski found the back of the net with just under six minutes remaining to propel the team to a 1–0 victory.
Head Coach Michael Tanke also noted the run the team went on at the end of the season, and their success on offense throughout the year. “I have mixed feelings about the season. You know, the last three weeks have been great and that’s what it should look like all year. We still need to get more consistent. We’re still proven to be dangerous – we score goals. I think we’re fourth in the league in goals scored. Last year, we were third, so that’s not a one-off.”
While the offense continued to score, the defense wasn’t as reliable. “Defensively we improved a lot but that’s also where we [still] have to improve. That goes to show you maybe the level of our defending last year was not close to where I’d like it to be. So we did improve a lot defensively, and we have a long way to go, but if I’m being very candid, everything’s taken maybe a year longer than I thought,” explained Coach Tanke.
Coach Tanke acknowledged that he will feel the effects of losing seniors and graduate students, potentially losing six in total. In a storybook ending to the season, it was Szablewski’s goal and fellow graduate student Riley Wagner’s assist that led the team to victory in their final game. “We ended with all the seniors out there today and the last goal, the only goal, was Riley Wagner to Luke Szablewski. They’ve been playing with each other since they were 10, they’re both local kids. And for that to be the assist-goal combo in the last game, that’s really cool,” Tanke described.
While their place in the standings wasn’t where Coach Tanke would’ve hoped, he has confidence in his team’s ability moving forward, saying, “It’s clear to me that the whole thing is moving in the right direction.”
Senior Ely Sidibe is proud to be a part of this team despite their place in the MAAC standings. He played 16 games this season and had a total of five goals, two of which were scored in a win against Fairfield. He recorded 11 points in the 880 minutes he played this season. Sidibe appreciates his teammates showing up to practice every day and working hard, and says, “I wouldn’t be here without the boys so I think it’s just a collective thing that brought me to play my best this season.”
The team finished 2–3–3 in conference play and 4–8–4 overall. Sidibe recognized that the team could have performed better, but is proud of the way they finished the season. He said, “It’s good to end it off the way we just ended off, we beat Niagara, we had a little streak at the end, so that is a good thing to take away from it.”
Photo courtesy of Tom Wolf
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