Colleges: Spartans, Lions have travelled different paths

TAMPA – As they meet to end the regular season at Pepin-Rood Stadium tonight at 7 p.m., it can easily be said that the seasons of the University of Tampa and Saint Leo men’s soccer teams have taken vastly different paths.

Tampa is currently ranked No.9 in the nation, has only lost once, and while it faces a tough road to get there should certainly be considered one of the favorites to advance to the NCAA Division II Final Four. The Spartans can earn a share of the Sunshine State Conference regular season title with a victory, something Coach Adrian Bush is happy about.

“Anytime you can close out the conference with a win before your final stretch of conference tournament and playoffs is good,” Bush said.

Saint Leo has gone the other way. After a 5-3 record in the SSC last season, the Lions cannot make the SSC tournament this year having only won twice in seven conference games entering Thursday night’s game.

Illness has affected the program for the whole season, with Coach Joel Harrison not knowing at times how many players he would have available on a day-to-day basis. The Lions appeared to be getting on the right track after putting together three straight wins at the beginning of October, including one over then No.14-ranked Lynn, but a pair of defeats to Barry and Nova Southeastern have left the side knowing tonight will be their final game of the season.

“It’s been frustrating, and all kind of things, it’s hard to put it into words,” Harrison said. “I don’t know if its hit us harder than anyone else, but I think our guys have still come out and worked hard and tried to do their best, and that’s all we can ask of them, you know, regardless of who’s healthy an who’s not to go out and compete and hopefully eventually things will start to pay off for us.”

Bush has little to no sympathy for what Saint Leo has gone through, noting that his side, and most sides, face similar adversity during a season.

"That's what you carry extra players on your team for," Bush said. "Every team goes through injuries, and if they want to make an excuse of a flu going through their team, I don't think there's a team in the country that hasn't experienced that.

"So they can sit there and pin-point excuses all they want, hopefully they're healthy now, and we'll see what their excuse is tomorrow."

The Spartans are certainly confident of earning victory. Spartans center back Dan Ingvarsson believes if his teammates take care of outworking the Lions, everything else will take care of itself.

“I know we’re a better soccer team,” Spartans center back Dan Ingvarsson said. “The only thing they can beat us at is work-rate, and if we bring the work-rate, there’s no way we can lose.”

Colleges: Glenn, Lions snap streak with big win

SAINT LEO – Saint Leo men’s soccer coach Joel Harrison tells his players to read the game, and to make decisions based on what their opponents is doing defensively against them.

On Tuesday night, Thomas University gave the Lions' midfield time and space, and the Lions took complete advantage, earning a 4-1 victory at University Field that snapped a five-game losing streak.

Jonathan Glenn scored twice for the Lions (4-6-0), ending a personal run of five games without a goal, including giving the Lions the lead in the fourth minute. Glenn slipped in behind the Night Hawks defense, rounding the advancing goalkeeper before coolly finishing into the open net.

“It was a big monkey off my shoulders,” Glenn said with a smile. “I was really going out for that, try to get it early to take the pressure of the whole team, and it came early so that was a great start.”

It didn’t get any better for the Night Hawks (4-5-0), who sat back and allowed the Lions to move the ball freely through the midfield. While trying to keep itself compact defensively, Thomas ended up giving the Lions freedom to roam down the flanks, and that ended up leading to Glenn’s second goal in the 24th minute.

After play was switched from the center to advancing left back Michael Panter, he hit an angled cross into the penalty area from 35 yards which found Glenn, whose powerful header gave Thomas goalkeeper Jan Feldman little chance. Harrison said he was glad not just that Glenn had found his way back onto the scoresheet, but the manner in which he had scored.

“They were good goals too, the first one we got him in behind, the second a nice service from Michael Panter,” Harrison said. “They were good runs, good finishes.”

The Lions added a third goal eight minutes later, Bruce Cutler getting a little fortunate as his shot from the edge of the penalty area deflected off a defender, looped over Feldman’s head and tucked in just under the crossbar. Cutler was excellent throughout, making good decisions with his distribution from midfield all game as the Lions controlled the bulk of possession in the first half.

That trend continued for the first 25 minutes of the second half as the Lions took the opportunity to play most of their bench, and Odyss Economides' run down the left created their fourth goal of the night as Freddy Menor finished the chance on the right side of the penalty area in the 61st minute.

After that, the game began to get a little sloppy, and a moment of poor play by the Lions in their backline led to the Night Hawks goal in the 77th minute, Alex Fleming finishing Gary Watkins cross from the right after a bad giveaway in the Lions half. But that was the only blemish on the performance for the Lions, who will likely get a far tougher test against No.14 Lynn on Saturday night.

At least for Tuesday, the victory was one to savor for the Lions.

“It was so frustrating,” Glenn said of the now-over five-game streak. “We have been playing so well, dominating teams, and we just couldn’t find a way to win, so this is a big, big weight off our shoulders.”

Colleges: Lions men getting back to full strength

SAINT LEO – While it hasn’t been quite on the same scale as its women’s team, the Saint Leo men’s soccer team hasn’t been having the best go of it in the health department either.

Thankfully, though, for Coach Joel Harrison, the Lions have almost their full squad back after the flu gradually made its way through the locker room.

According to Harrison, the illnesses started popping up after the trip to Georgia Southwestern State. At one point the squad was reduced to only 14 players at training, and the Lions had to play with a vastly shorter bench than normal. That affected the team’s preparation leading into its games last week against Flagler and Rollins.

Now he has all but two of three members of the 30-man roster available, meaning the Lions can incorporate 11-on-11 work into practice again, something Harrison said helps a great deal.

“In practice, you work on pieces, you take pieces of the game and work on it, and you want to be able to put that into a full-sided game at the end,” Harrison said. “We could work on the bits and pieces, but we couldn’t put it into the full-sided to make sure that everyone was getting it worked on in an 11-on-11 match.”

Now the Lions face Eckerd on Tuesday night before hosting Florida Tech on Saturday night. The Lions are currently on a three-game losing streak, but Harrison is focused on what lies ahead for his team.

“For us we’re just focusing, I know its cliché-ish, but we’re focusing on one game at a time,” he said. “You can’t predict the future, and you can’t go back and change the past, so you focus on the next match and go out and do the best we can.”

MAKING A MARK: Freshman Erik Mozzo hasn’t been shy about making his presence felt, something that has made Harrison very happy with his young goalkeeper.

“Sometimes freshmen don’t want to tell upperclassmen what to do,” Harrison said, “but as a goalkeeper he’s stepped right in and he knows it doesn’t matter what year I am in school, I’ve got to talk to the guys in front of me to tell them what I want.”

Mozzo, from Beaufort, S.C., has already earned a Sunshine State Conference defensive player of the week award, and has quickly earned the trust of the rest of the team. Harrison said his play isn’t a surprise, because when the team brought him in for tryouts, as Division II schools are allowed to in recruiting, he was exactly the same way.

“He was back there, he never kept anything to himself,” Harrison said. “We’ve reinforced that he’s got to continue doing that, but he was already doing that.”

STEPPING UP: The absences caused by injuries meant that some new faces got chances to contribute to the side, and Harrison is pleased with what he has seen from many of them.

“Cody Allen has done very well,” Harrison said. “He’s a kid who in his first two years didn’t play a lot, and has stepped in and done very well.”

Three freshmen have also caught the coach’s eye, with Matt Stewart, Jason Manaras and Michael Panter all finding themselves on the field at key points of recent games. Harrison said he thought Panter did very well after being brought on late against Rollins as he provided dangerous crosses into the Tars penalty area when the Lions were looking for an equalizer.

“We’ve had a couple of younger guys that haven’t played a lot,” Harrison said. “But when they’ve got in they’ve done well and are starting to get a feel for college soccer.”