MEN’S SOCCER

The Forester men’s soccer team enjoyed their largest margin of victory of the season Wednesday afternoon at King Stadium with a 4-1 win over Manchester University (2-4-1) in their final outing before conference play.

Entering today’s neighborly rivalry, three of the last four matchups between these the two squads have ended in a tie with the first of three OT stalemates dating back to September of 2015. The fourth contest in that stretch also needed extra time before HU prevailed 2-1. Prior to 2015, the Foresters have owned the series against the Spartans 6-2-1.

“I thought our performance today was a great bounce back from Monday’s loss to Ohio Northern,” said Coach Lawson. “We got on our front foot right away so being able to turn them over higher up the pitch got our momentum going.”

Sophomore Will Lengacher claimed man of the match honors. Making his varsity debut, Lengacher found back netting in the 39th minute when Noah Stanford played a ball across the box off a long throw in for what proved the game-winner.

Lengacher’s first collegiate goal came just over 60 seconds after a Manchester breakaway had knotted things up at 1-1 with the game’s first score coming by way of Luke Unger’s PK 15 minutes in.

The 2-1 difference stood through halftime before Christian Kohen scored on a header at the 57:44 mark to give his team a little breathing room. James Howard then put the finishing touches on the match when he slotted the keeper in the 77th minute for his first goal in Forester green and white. Lengacher was credited with the assist to wrap up a memorable day for the Leo native.

Gabe Greenfield spent the first 74 minutes in net during which he recorded a save on his way to being credit with the win before Blake Cooke came in on relief.

“This has been the toughest pre-conference schedule in our program’s history,” noted Lawson. “So for us to get results in seven of those nine matches is a credit to our boys for staying together.

“We had to get creative in several of our wins and I think it says a lot about the spirt of this team.”

Huntington (6-2-1) has the weekend off before opening up league play on Wednesday at Grace.