It was a season-high offensive explosion for the Trinity Western Spartans men’s soccer team.
The Spartans erased a 1-0 deficit to score four times in a 4-2 victory over the MacEwan Griffins on Saturday night at TWU’s Chase Office Field, improving to 6-1-1 on the season.
The six victories are the highest for the TWU men’s soccer team — ranked sixth nationally — in the last four seasons.
“It was one of those games where MacEwan put up a good fight and the group that we started with in the first half struggled to break them down,” said Spartans coach Mike Shearon. “The things we have been doing well in the last few games, we stopped doing tonight. We didn’t connect our passes. We stopped moving and running and they caught us on the counter. But credit to MacEwan. They ran the whole game.
“In the second half, there are a lot of guys who have been frustrated because they’re not getting the minutes and they went out there and put in a good performance.”
After Lahai Mansaray put the visitors ahead 1-0 in the 31st minute, TWU’s Jacob Low connected on a cross from Caleb Johnson to tie the score in the 45th minute.
Vilo Poletto then scored twice less than nine minutes apart in the 52nd and 60th minutes.
And a few moments later, Elijah Adekugbe made it 4-1.
Bryce Prochnau made it 4-2 just before full time.
The Spartans fired 16 shots, eight of them on target while the Griffins scored on both their shots.
The win came the day after a 1-1 draw with the Mount Royal Cougars.
The goals came within a minute of each other with Adekugbe scoring in the 28th minute before the Cougars’ Justin Anderson-Louch responded for the visitors.
“It was two good teams playing. But while it was exciting, it was also disappointing because we didn’t get the win. Of the two teams, I thought we did more to get the win and were a bit unfortunate,” Shearon said.
The Spartans are on the road to face Saskatchewan on Friday and Winnipeg on Sunday.
