DULUTH, Minn. - No. 4 Gustavus men's soccer secured a share of the MIAC regular season championship and the No. 1 seed for conference playoffs with a decisive 5-0 win at St. Scholastica on Saturday. The Gusties, who finish the regular season undefeated for the second time in three years, enter the MIAC playoffs 14-0-3 overall and 8-0-2 in the league. The MIAC regular season championship is the 18th in program history.
Spencer Skjeldestad started the scoring in the ninth minute with his first goal of the season, assisted by
Brian Brown.
Cal Avery then tallied his first goal of the year in the 22nd minute with the help of
Miles Redmond and
Owen Johnson, and the score remained 2-0 at halftime with the Gusties out-shooting the Saints 14-3.
Joe Flory made it 3-0 in the 48th minute, assisted by Johnson, and then posted his team-leading 10th goal of the season less than six minutes later, this time helped by
Simon Woods.
Darren Chukel put a stamp on the victory in the 81st minute with his second goal of the season, assisted by
Diego Paulin and Woods.
Gustavus out-shot St. Scholastica 32-4 overall and 18-2 on goal as
Egan Bedwell earned his 11th shutout of the season, which is the most in NCAA Division III. Bedwell lowered his goals against average to 0.53, which ranks 17th in the nation.
"I'm immensely proud of this team," said Head Coach
Tudor Flintham. "They just don't let their foot off the gas. They knew what was at stake today and that can crumble some teams, but these guys honestly just find a way. To go undefeated through a regular season is an incredible accomplishment. To do it in the current MIAC and with our non-conference schedule just isn't something you expect. Today was a really professional display of how you handle this kind of situation. The defensive effort and organization was exactly what it's been all season, just really impressive from a unit who've been dialed in. We went deep into a talented bench. But I need to highlight a few guys,
Jared Hecht is different level right now. Spencer is probably our best all around player in most games and
Joe Flory is firing all cylinders at the right time. We will celebrate this, championships in the MIAC don't come easy. So we have no thoughts about what's up next. We will deal with that on Monday. Go Gusties!"
As the No. 1 seed for MIAC playoffs, Gustavus earned a first round bye and will face the lowest remaining seed in the semifinals at 2 p.m. Thursday. The Gusties' potential opponent is either No. 4 Bethel, No. 5 Carleton, or No. 6 Macalester. The MIAC championship game is set for 1 p.m. next Saturday.
