Amanda Boyer/Photography Editor
The men’s soccer team will wrap up their regular season on the road on Thursday, Nov. 6 as the Pirates take on the St. John’s Red Storm.
The Hall is coming off a 3-3 draw against Marquette (1-3-4). The Pirates (1-4-3) took the Warriors to double overtime after evening the game at three on a goal by senior defender Mateusz Brela at the 73rd minute of regulation. For Brela, the goal was his third of the season.
While the Hall’s final home game of the regular season on Saturday saw fellow seniors Victor Manosalvas and Bolu Akinyode find the back of the net on Senior Day.
The goal by Manosalvas was his sixth on the season, while Akinoyde’s was his third, and was part of a performance that also included an assist and earned him a spot on the Big East Men’s Soccer Weekly Honor Roll this week, a first for the Nigerian-midfielder.
While the draw keeps the Hall with only one victory in conference play, coming from an Oct. 18 1-0 win versus Georgetown, the Pirates played well on Saturday against Marquette.
“There were a lot of positives, some negatives, but I saw a lot of resilience and fight against a good Marquette team- a nationally ranked team at that,” head coach Garrison Echeverry said of the team’s performance against 24th-ranked Marquette.
With the tie, the Hall’s post-season hopes remain alive. The Pirates can still earn the conference's sixth and final playoff berth with a win at St. John's on Thursday’s regular season finale. The team will still need some help to secure the spot; Seton Hall trails the sixth-place Butler Bulldogs by two points, and the Bulldogs own the head-to-head tiebreaker. Marquette sits between Seton Hall and Butler in the conference standings and is also still alive for the sixth-seed in the tournament. The Pirates would need a Butler loss at Xavier and also a Marquette loss or tie in their season finale against DePaul.
“We need a win on Thursday,” Echeverry said. “We have to stop giving up silly goals and limit mistakes from the back. We’re going to need to make opportunities and capitalize on them. St. John’s does not give a lot of opportunities for scoring. Their record may not show it, but they’re a very difficult team to play.”
St John’s is heading into Thursday’s match with an overall record of 4-9-4, 0-6-2 in conference play. They are also coming off of a 1-0 loss to Georgetown. Georgetown’s Bakie Goodman’s goal at the 40th minute was all that would go past Red Storm goalkeeper and redshirt-senior Jordan Stagmiller. The keeper has started all 17 of the team’s matches this season, and should be should go for his 18th start on Thursday.
Meanwhile, the Pirates will go to sophomore Julian Spindler for the 17th time this season. The Weiersbach, German-native has started every game for the blue and white this season.
In their last meeting, the Pirates were shut out 5-0 by the Red Storm at home for their final game of the regular season.
Echeverry has made it a priority that the team has taken time to recover from Saturday’s match. The team took Monday to get their energy back and prepare for the following practices this week.
“We’re going to keep training to fully recover and recuperate,” he said. “We want to be at 100 percent when we play St. John’s on Thursday.”
The final regular season game at St. John’s is scheduled to start at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 6.
Olivia Mulvihill can be reached at olivia.mulvihill@student.shu.edu
