West Chester men’s soccer team battled throughout the week and fought to improve their record to .500.
The first test was a road match up against a solid Philadelphia University team. The theme for West Chester’s soccer team has been failing to win the crucial moments. They can play with anyone; they have explosive offensive players and a strong defensive back.
They took a step in the right direction in their game against Philadelphia University. Although the end result was a scoreless tie, not exactly their preferred outcome, they can take positives away from the match.
It was a very physical soccer game between the two teams. Philadelphia was handed three yellow cards to three different players. However, the promising note that West Chester can take away is that in a game where they were outplayed and outshot, they stuck together as a team and found a way to force this game into overtime.
West Chester’s best scoring chance came in the final seconds of the first half when Giovanni Mowrey hit the crossbar and Philadelphia cleared the ball out of the box.
Philadelphia University had four chances throughout the game to put one in the back of the net but West Chester goalkeeper Matt Palmer was able to snuff it out each time.
In both overtimes West Chester and Philadelphia’s defenses proved to be superior as no imminent threat of scoring from either side came into play. The Golden Rams would finish with their second tie on the season and head back to West Chester to get ready for a home match up against Shippensburg on the weekend.
The game against Shippensburg may have been looked at as a pivotal game in this West Chester season. West Chester came into the game looking to improve their record to a .500 mark as Shippensburg was attempting to improve their PSAC record.
This was another very physical match up but the referees let them play through it as only one card was handed out in a game that could have easily seen multiple cards. This game featured a lot of offense as both goalkeepers were kept on their toes.
West Chester struck first when freshman Kyle Hoops was able to take a pass from Roberto Silva and sneak it past the goalkeeper in a very crowded scoring box.
That lead did not hold for long. Shippensburg’s Jake Shefsky got his head on a brilliant pass from teammate Robert Furfaro and was able to get it past Palmer to knot the game up 1-1. The score remained the same as both teams headed into halftime.
West Chester came out in the second half ready to go. They were a team that wanted to win. They took the lead early on in the second half on a goal by Max Adarkwah again off a pass from Roberto Silva. This time Silva sent a cross that Adarkwah got his head on the ball and sent it right in the left hand side of the goal.
West Chester didn’t relinquish anything after the goal. Brian Schaefer took a pass from Miguel Ross and fired it past Shippensburg’s Matt Harder for the goal. But head coach Michael Benn did not want West Chester to relax, as West Chester was in this situation before earlier in the season. Up by multiple goals with about ten minutes remaining resulted in a tie just a few games ago. Benn did not want to see that happen again, and it did not.
West Chester showed growth as a team as they closed out a tough stretch at the end of the game, taking down PSAC rival Shippensburg University, 3-2.
They will look to continue this momentum on Tuesday Sept. 29 when they travel to take on Millersville University.
Ryan Calpin is a fourth-year student majoring in communications with a minor in journalism. He can be reached at RC784188@wcupa.edu.