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Men’s soccer drops conference road opener at WMU

October 18, 2014
Len Henison

Len Henison

After a scoreless first half, Western Michigan scored three goals in 21 minutes Saturday afternoon to claim at 3-0 win over the NIU men’s soccer team at the WMU Soccer Complex.

“Overall, I didn’t think Western Michigan was better than us on the day, they just wanted it more,” said NIU head coach Eric Luzzi. “It’s disappointing to be honest because we had a really good week of training, and we were excited for the game. We’ll move on from this one pretty quickly and get back to work on Monday to prepare for SIUE on Wednesday.”

NIU (2-6-5, 0-1-1 MAC) redshirt junior goalkeeper Andrew Glaeser was called into action just over a minute into the contest, stopping a shot from Western Michigan’s Greg Timmer.

In the 19th minute, the Huskies had a pair of chances as freshman Len Heinson (Wuppertal, Germany/Carl-Fuhlrott Gymnasium) took a shot that was blocked and sophomore Chris Paton (Glasgow, Scotland/Uddingston Grammar School) followed up with a chance that was stopped by Western Michigan Drew Shepherd.

With just over three minutes to play in the first half, Glaeser made another save, stopping a shot from Sean Conerty as the game went to the intermission scoreless.

Western Michigan (7-4-3, 1-0-1 MAC) struck first in the 51st minute on a goal by Hunter Vandenboom. The Broncos connected passes through Timmer and Nick Wysong before finding Vandenboom who tapped home at the near post.

Taylor Cole

Taylor Cole

WMU doubled its lead on a corner kick in the 70th minute. Conerty took the corner and Timmer rose highest to head in the corner as the Broncos took a 2-0 lead.

Two minutes later, the Broncos scored again off a corner kick. Connor Furgason found the net on a bicycle kick off assists by Logan Wright and Wysong.

NIU pushed to get back in the game, junior Taylor Cole (Clarendon Hills, Ill./Hinsdale Central/St. John’s) forced a save from Shepherd in the 73rd minute. Two minutes later senior Isaac Kannah (Plymouth, Minn./Prairie Seeds Academy) fired just wide and senior Andrew Palumbo (Ft. Myers, Fla./Bishop Verot/Darton College) had a shot saved in the 84th minute.

Glaeser finished with a pair of stops for NIU while Shepherd made three saves for the Broncos.

NIU will return to action at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 22, when the Huskies host SIU Edwardsville in their final non-conference game of the season. For more information on NIU men’s soccer and Huskie athletics, visit www.niuhuskies.com.