By: Adam Gorski
The Canisius men’s soccer team established a new program record in their last two games of the 2021 season but could not manage to score a second win on the season.
The Griffs fell 4-1 to Fairfield on the team’s senior day on Saturday and followed that up with a 4-2 defeat on the road to rival Niagara on Wednesday.
Despite the two losses, Canisius tallied goals in both matches to set a new record for the most consecutive matches with a goal (12) in program history. The previous mark was set between the end of the 2002 and the beginning of the 2003 seasons.
Canisius would get on the board first in Saturday’s match and they didn’t waste much time in doing so, as Lachlan Beever managed to evade Stags goalkeeper Will Marment and slide the ball into the net just under two minutes into the match to make it 1-0.
Fairfield would answer back however in the tone of four unanswered goals, three of which came from Jonathan Filipe.
The scoring run started courtesy of a strike from Thomas Drillen in the 20th minute, and Filipe’s first of the match in the 37th minute gave Fairfield a 2-1 lead at halftime. Filipe would tally again in the 47th minute after the Stags were awarded a penalty kick and the senior stepped up and buried it into the top left corner of Canisius goalkeeper William Howard’s goal. Filipe would finish off his hat trick in the 88th minute to finish off the Griffs.
Shot attempts were tied 11-11, but Fairfield ended with seven on target to Canisius’ five.
In their rivalry game against Niagara, it was once again a series of unanswered tallies and an opposition hat trick that would sink Canisius in an eventful match that saw 52 total shot attempts, ending 29(14)-23(8) in favor of the Purple Eagles.
Three goals in a span of ten minutes in the first half allowed Niagara to jump out to a substantial lead and force the Griffs to play from behind. Gabriel Mikina got the Purple Eagles on the board in the 16th minute, which was followed by a quick brace from Jelldrik Dallman, as the MAAC’s leading goal scorer struck first in the 24th minute and then buried a penalty kick 1:42 later as the Purple Eagles held onto their 3-0 advantage at halftime.
Glorie Ndagano would pull one back for Canisius in the 56th minute off a nifty finish for his collegiate goal, but Dallman reestablished Niagara’s three-goal lead with his hat trick tally eight minutes later.
Beever would get in on the action for the Griffs’ second goal in the 80th minute, marking his team-leading sixth goal of the season, but it was all his side could muster the rest of the way. Junior goalkeeper Spencer Catalano tallied eight saves in the loss, a new career high.
Canisius finishes the year at the bottom of the MAAC standings, marking the third consecutive season the Griffs have found themselves last at the conclusion of their campaign.