Battling a stiff wind and driving rain, the North Park Vikings defeated Virginia’s Washington & Lee University 3-0 to advance to their first-ever NCAA Elite Eight soccer game Sunday.
Senior Shatil Khoury struck first for the Vikings, scoring just 1:47 minutes into the first half on a pass from sophomore Peder Nalum Olsen. The 25-mile-per-hour wind-whipped flags and made the ball difficult to pass, keeping the Vikings on the defense for most of the first half. But sophomore goalie Mathias Stulen was able to keep the ball out of the net the entire game, earning the shutout.
The Vikings scored on the Generals again with just 5 minutes left in the first half, when sophomore Gustav Ericsson deked a defender and passed to senior Mathias Warp, who booted the ball in. The Vikings final goal came in the second half off a sweet backward heel pass from Warp to senior Chase Lennartz.
Although the Generals had more shots on goal than the Vikings, they failed to capitalize on their best opportunity, with Stulen making a diving save on a line drive shot by the Generals with just 7:30 left in the game.
The Vikings will move on to the Elite Eight round of the tournament, where they will face the winner of Saturday’s matchup of Ohio’s Otterbein University v. University of St. Thomas of Minnesota. That game will also be hosted by North Park, at 1 p.m. Sunday at the Holmgren Athletic Complex.
If the Vikings win tomorrow, they will move into the Final Four, with a shot at the Division III National Championship in North Carolina in the beginning of December.
Sunday’s game will again be live streamed on North Park’s Facebook and on the Athletic Department’s website.