Spicer helps men's soccer blank Drexel

Men's soccer had its home opener against Drexel at Lourie-Love Field last night, revenging last week's loss to Akron with a 3-0 win over Drexel.

Both teams entered the game off a loss. Princeton (1-1) found itself on the receiving end of a 6-0 beating from Akron last week., while Drexel (2-1) dropped a 4-0 decision to La Salle, hampered by a two-man defecit when two players were ejected with red cards - one being the Dragons' starting goalie.

But it was the Tigers who proved to be the hungrier team.

"It was a big turnaround after [the loss to Akron] last week," freshman defender Robbie Morgenroth said. "Our defense was good. We worked hard on it in practice. We defended first, and opportunities came from it."

The tough defense provided by the backfield sent Drexel repeatedly backpedaling to prepare for Princeton counterattacks.

After 31 minutes, 48 seconds of play, the Tiger offense found fruit at last when a pass by junior midfield Ben Young found the foot of junior midfield Sean Paylor. Paylor wasted no time in putting the first goal on the scoreboard.

Entering the second half, Princeton's defense was put to the test as Dragon shots rained down on the goal, keeping senior goalie Erik White busy diving for the soccer ball. Drexel never got close enough in the first half to have any shots on goal and only one corner kick, but recorded four shots and four corner kicks in the second.

But Tiger defense stayed tight, and within the first seven minutes, junior forward Darren Spicer saw an opportunity to carry the ball upfield. Beating his defender, Spicer next pulled the Drexel goalie out of the box. Knocking the ball to the right of a sliding Dragon keeper, Spicer unloaded the ball into the gaping net to put Princeton up, 2-0.

With 8:33 to go, Spicer struck again. A chip from senior midfield Arturo Tafolla allowed Spicer to dump the ball over the goalie's shoulder into the back of the net.

"Defense was good. We made that a priority here and built on it," head coach Jim Barlow said. " We created good opportunities. We didn't create many opportunities, but we created good ones."

Princeton prevented a Drexel comeback during the remaining nine minutes, and the Tigers were rewarded with their second win of the season and a strong rallying point from which they hope to build on as they make their way one step closer to a NCAA berth.