Wofford Men's Soccer Defeat Bears in OT
Spartanburg, SC – The Wofford men's soccer team had to come from behind twice in a hard-fought matchup to force overtime, and less than two minutes into the OT frame,
Ben Nickol found the back of the net to seal the victory for the Terriers.
Wofford bumps up its record to 3-8-1 overall and 1-0-1 in conference play. The first conference loss for Mercer sends their record to 8-4 overall. This was the first win for the Terriers against Mercer since their first ever meeting back in October 2014, where Wofford came away with a 2-1 win.
The first 10 minutes saw very little action as both teams were figuring each other out. The opening goal would come from an uncleared corner in the Terriers' box, as the Mercer striker found his head to it to give the Bears a 1-0 lead. Another back-and-forth 10 minutes of play, but this time it would be the Terriers who would strike and equalize. A
Lucas Altman free-kick from 27 yards out soared into the top-right corner to level the score 1-1.
There was plenty of action in the second half, including a penalty save from
Grant Wollam. Wollam would dive to his left making a strong two-handed save and pushing the ball out of bounds to keep the score at 1-1. Mercer would take the lead once again in the 80
th minute, but that didn't break Wofford's spirits.
With 15 seconds remaining,
Ole Berg pushed up the field and connected just outside the 18-yard box, sending the ball off of the woodwork and into the net, forcing overtime.
One minute into the OT period, senior
Ben Nickol was called upon after an injury to
Austin Tuggle. Little did Nickol know, he would see his teammates mob him on the field just 27 seconds later. Nickol found himself on the end of a through ball from Eduardo Velasco and secured the victory for the Terriers.
"It is hard to process all that we just witnessed in a twenty minute span," said head coach
Joel Tyson. "We had a goal called back, we gave up a penalty and saved the penalty kick, conceded a late goal and then getting a goal with ten seconds left, along with the game winner in overtime. It is incredible to see all the steps that the game took to get to this point. I am elated for our group to get a massive result over a really good team in the conference."
Wofford returns to action Saturday, October 19 as they travel to take on UNC Greensboro at 7 p.m.
