Posted: Sep 01, 2023
By Francisco Claudio
If you read the title of this article then you must be telling yourself, "What a game."
Well, you're going to want to make the trip down to watch the Westcliff men's soccer team play so you don't miss any of the action this season.
Thursday evening, the Warriors hosted Stanton University for the first meeting between the programs.
The Warriors made quite a first impression over Stanton as they had a monstrous eight goals in the second half and earned the clean sheet for a final, 9-0.
Westcliff started the game being the aggressor and had four shots to Stanton's one, in the first 15 minutes of play.
Then came a quick sequence on the left side for Westcliff with a couple of passes by Jordan Di Lonardo and Wissem Obeid to John Adekunle who set himself up on his right foot and hit it passed the goalkeeper for the first goal.
Adekunle has scored in every game for the Warriors so far this season.
The rest of the first half was pretty even between both teams with the Warriors having shot the ball six times versus four from Stanton.
Then came the onslaught from Westcliff which started a minute into the second half.
After a forward push from Westcliff into deep Stanton territory and a couple of deflections, the ball found Di Lonardo who took it off the air with a strong right into the back of the net.
There was nothing Stanton's goalkeeper could have done to save such a well-placed kick.
The skill of play in this match had just gone up to another level.
"We came in at halftime wanting to raise the level a bit," said head coach Randy Dodge. "Stanton gave us a really good first half, made us have to solve a few more problems than we've had to do in the last couple of games. But they also changed their system which played into our hands."
Next up was Vincenzo Centrella who scored after a couple of assists from Jussi Gerberding and Di Lonardo.
One minute later, captain Janis Hinterleitner was feeling the momentum and took a shot from way outside the penalty area for a goal.
Daniel Segal was credited with the assist to Hinterleitner.
And if you have been following the Warriors this season, you know that Hinterleitner has taken a couple of those shots from way outside, so the goal was coming.
One minute later Gledi Doda and Di Lonardo set up Obeid perfectly as he scored for the third consecutive game.
A couple of minutes later Adenkunle was working his magic and scored his second goal of the game after an assist from Quentin Hornung.
"We scored four goals in the first 13 minutes when they went into a back three against my three front runners," Dodge said. "My three front runners are very special and there are a number of guys off the bench that are pretty special."
There was a bit of calm after the Warriors' storm of goals before Rui Tsubakihara's attacking attempt in the penalty box led to a Stanton defender careless foul.
Nicolas Berriche stepped up to take the penalty kick and placed it down the middle as the goalie flung himself left.
If you've been keeping track up to this point the Warriors were in the lead 7-0, but one of the best goals of the year was yet to come.
Doda stepped up to take a corner kick for the Warriors and after a fortunate bounce found a wide-open Diego Montes who had the crazy idea to do something acrobatic on this night.
Montes set himself up for a bicycle kick that surprised everyone watching including Stanton's goalkeeper who could do nothing to prevent the magic from happening.
Up 8-0, Westcliff had one more in them as Goncalo Costa took the ball himself in the 89th minute and scored the ninth goal.
It was an eventful night and one that the team will feel very happy and positive about before they travel to face a really good UCSD opponent.
But that's how it is in sports.
You win one game, take the positives and you move on to the next game.
"Now we go down to play UCSD, a DI school to get ready for our conference game in the stadium against Embry Riddle," Dodge said. "We have a good spirit about us and we have a good group of guys out there."
Dodge emphasized that the team won't get carried away after a win like this because the next opponent you start from the beginning and prepare anew.
"It's a level and standard that we're expecting out of them to be professional about your job," Dodge said. "We have 45 minutes in the first half against UCSD, and we'll see where we're at. Then we'll do the second 45 and see where we're at.
"I'm very demanding in training, very demanding during the game and I don't accept mediocracy and I don't accept arrogance."
Westcliff will travel to UCSD this Sunday, September 3rd.
The game will be in the evening with a 7PM kick-off.
Dodge will prepare the team to face their strongest opponent of this season and make sure they're in the right mindset.
"You have that level of humility when you win and when you lose."
Stay tuned for more details after Sunday's game.
