Five Straight YSCC Tournament Titles for CMCC Men's Soccer

Pottersville, NY – CMCC Men's Soccer took home its fifth Yankee Small College Conference Tournament championship thanks to a 4-0 win over rival #2 SMCC. The title match, hosted at the Word of Life Bible Institute in New York, saw the Mustangs and Seawolves go into halftime still even at 0-0 before the Central Maine offense roared to life in the second half. Four different players registered a goal, and the defense held Southern Maine without a shot on net for the entire 90 minutes.

The win guarantees #1 nationally ranked CMCC a spot in the USCAA DII National Tournament in Pittsburgh, PA where the Mustangs will attempt to defend their 2024 national championship. This year's tournament will run from November 13-17 with two groups of three teams vying for a spot in the national title match.

Both teams started tepidly to open the game. Central Maine worked several looks around the area but saw their shots closed down and blocked by defenders. Southern Maine made the choice to leave several key players on the bench to start the game after their semifinal with #3 Paul Smith's College went the full distance to penalty kicks the day before. All-Conference selections Tim Eulenberger and Louis Sehr subbed on after resting for the first quarter of an hour, joined by Jil-Emmanuel Sehr, Chandrel Laza, and Jaxon Olsen.

CMCC's first solid chance came in the 18^th minute. Albie Fozard-Oakes served in a great diagonal pass for captain Mitch Cameron. SMCC goalkeeper Adao Lufumbu gambled and came out to meet him, arriving at the same time and getting a piece to deflect the ball up in the air. Daniel Semple attempted to scramble in the rebound, but it was cleared out of the box to keep things scoreless.

In the second half, Southern Maine got the first scoring chance less than two minutes after the restart. A Central Maine short corner was sniffed out and the Seawolves launched a counterattack up field. Laza blazed past center back Charlie Leclerc and motored into the box before squaring for Eulenberger, but the SMCC captain put his shot wide of the far post.

The Mustangs finally found an opening in the 52^nd minute. Yoan Thériault sent a through ball down the right sideline for Fozard-Oakes to chase down. The first-year from Northwich, England got to it first, beat his defender to the end line, and cut a great pass back towards the top of the box. Semple was wide open to curl his shot into the side netting of the bottom corner. It was his 16^th goal of the campaign and gave Fozard-Oakes his USCAA-leading 15^th assist of the season.

It was 2-0 five minutes later. Thériault was once again the architect, pinging a long ball over the top from his own half. Fozard-Oakes put pressure on defender Cole Adawadkar, who tried to shield him off for Lufumbu to come and collect. But the Seawolves' keeper stayed at home allowing Fozard-Oakes to nick in and put his shot into the back of the net.

It went from bad to worse for Southern Maine in the 70^th minute. Midfielder Amisi Ngomu received a red card when he lunged into a challenge on Fozard-Oakes and made contact with the CMCC player's head. Seeing their opponent reduced to ten men, Central Maine pressed forward and drew a penalty in the 73^rd minute when forward Sam Boynton was scythed down in the box by Adawadkar. Sophomore Mikel Soto stepped up to take the spot kick and dispatched his shot into the top corner for the Madrid, Spain native's first goal of the season.

The Mustangs then wrapped things up in style just a tick beyond the 82^nd minute. Cameron headed down a short goal kick in midfield, finding Drew Hatala about 30 yards out. The Oak Hill High School product turned his man brilliantly to work a patch of free space, before curling a long-distance effort off the far post and in, just beyond the fingertips of the diving Lufumbu. It was Hatala's fifth goal of the campaign and only his second since an early season scoring streak in September.

The victory gives CMCC 37 straight wins and 45 games unbeaten in conference competition, with their last loss coming in their YSCC opener back in 2021. The Mustangs completed a three-game sweep of the archrival Seawolves for the second straight year and defeated SMCC in the Yankee Conference playoffs for the fifth consecutive campaign. The sides have met in the championship match two of the last three seasons.

Central Maine heads into the USCAA National Tournament as the consensus #1 overall team, having gone unbeaten to this point with a 13-0-3 record. The Mustangs will wait to find out who they'll face in Pittsburgh, PA. The USCAA's men's soccer selection show is scheduled for Wednesday, November 5^th at 4:00 pm.