When Vito Poletto scores, the Trinity Western Spartans win, simple as that.
Poletto scored twice — once on Friday and again on Saturday — and both times, the Spartans men’s soccer team was victorious.
The team improved to 3-2-1 with Poletto scoring in all three victories.
Trinity Western was hosting the UBC Okanagan Heat the first night and the Thompson Rivers WolfPack, the next, with both games played at TWU’s Rogers Field.
The Spartans beat the Heat 2-1 and the WolfPack 1-0.
“I think we played really well in certain matches,” said Spartans coach Pat Rohla.
“The times we moved through with a penetrating pass that linked into a penetrating run, we were fine.
“The times we took it wide and came back inside and took it through, we were great. But we didn’t have enough frequency of that.”
The lone goal came in the 41st minute when Poletto took a pass from Joel Waterman, raced through the middle of the park, and then whipped a shot back across his body to beat the Thompson Rivers goalkeeper.
That was more than enough offence as Evan Lowther stopped all three WolfPack shots which were on target.
Against the Heat — who had beaten the Spartans 2-1 earlier this month — Dominic Reinold scored in the fourth minute and Poletto doubled the lead in the 47th minute.
The Heat’s Andrew Stevenson scored in the 90th minute to ruin Lowther’s shutout bid. The goalkeeper did finish with three saves.
•••
Ally Oliverio scored on a penalty kick while her sister Christina posted a shutout as the Trinity Western Spartans remain unbeaten on the season.
The Spartans women’s soccer team defeated the Thompson Rivers WolfPack 1-0 on Saturday at Rogers Park on the TWU campus.
Trinity Western also played at home the night before with Jessica King scoring a hat trick in a 5-2 win over the UBC Okanagan Heat. Krista Gommeringer and Vanessa Kovacs had the other TWU goals.
The results improve the team — who were listed third in last week’s national rankings — to 5-0-1.
“It’s very positive that we won, but we know that we can be better,” said TWU coach Graham Roxburgh, following Saturday’s victory.
“There were good performances tonight, but we just weren’t really that sharp.”
He did single out the play of Jenn Castillo and Kat Chin as standing out on Saturday, while Lindsay Pulice did so the game before.
The Spartans dominated the game as they fired 24 shots at the Thompson Rivers net, with nine hitting the target. By comparison, the WolfPack attempted nine shots, but none were on goal.
Against the Heat, TWU scored on five of their six shots on goal and they never trailed, going ahead in the second minute.
King had scored in the first five Spartans games this season before failing to find the back of the WolfPack net on Saturday.
She is tied for the Canada West lead with eight goals through the first six games.
•••
Both Spartan soccer teams are on the road this weekend in Prince George for a pair of games against the UNBC Timberwolves.
