Garcia's Seven Saves Shuts Out Bison, 3-0
SILOAM SPRINGS, Ark. (October 12, 2013) -- Three different Golden Eagles found the back of the net and senior goalkeeper Pablo Garcia knocked away seven Bison shots en route to a 3-0 victory over Oklahoma Baptist (1-10-0, 0-5-0 SAC) this afternoon at Alumni Field.
While the shots narrowly favored John Brown, 17-14, it was the Golden Eagles that held possession for the vast majority of the match, highlighted by a 9-3 advantage in corner kicks. The visitors out-shot JBU 11-9 in the second half, but the match was never in question as Garcia and back line held strong.
"When it comes to conference matches, you'll take any win you can get," head coach Scott Marksberry admitted. "However, we had better sharpen up our game before Wayland Baptist next week."
The Golden Eagles (6-6-0, 2-2-0 SAC) fired eight shots towards OBU netminder Colin Spencer in the first 45 minutes and finally broke through in the 36th minute when junior Ryan Duncan collected his sixth goal of the season. As a result of impressive passing on JBU's part, sophomore Eli Simonsen started a rush up the middle before dumping the ball off to sophomore forward Zari Prescod. Prescod cut into the middle pushing a pass out wide to sophomore forward Cory Cole who laid a perfectly placed ball in the box that Duncan finished for the 1-0 lead.
As the physical play continued in the second half, the Golden Eagles widened its lead to two in the 55th minute. Again jump-started by a Simonsen possession, junior forward Martin Gonzalez placed a lovely though ball to streaking Luke Theimer up the left-center flank. Theimer, keeping two Baptist defenders at bay, sent a seeing-eye strike to the far right post, doubling the John Brown advantage.
John Brown capped off its scoring in the 80th minute as a result of OBU pushing forward, looking to find the score sheet. With only a couple players back, the Golden Eagles quickly transitioned to offense when Duncan sent a ball past his defender on a one-on-one, flying past his mark up the right sidelines before sending a ball to an awaiting Marco Cardona. Cardona settled the well-played pass in the box and, after showing impressive patience, out-waited Spencer before sliding the third tally past the sprawled netminder.
Garcia (6-6-0) played arguably his best half of soccer this season, stopping six Oklahoma Baptist shots in the second half en route to his sixth victory of the season and his first shutout in 2013. Garcia now has 11 clean sheets in his career. Spencer (1-9-1) took the loss for Baptist, finishing the match with four saves.
Gonzalez paced all JBU players with four shots in the match while Simonsen and Prescod each notched three apiece. Gonzalez and Cardona both fired a pair of attempts on goal.
The Golden Eagles will face one of its toughest tasks in its next match on Saturday (Oct. 19) when No. 10 Wayland Baptist makes its way to Siloam Springs for a 1:00 p.m. bout.
