The men’s soccer team has carried their momentum through their final week of regular season play with a 17-0-1 winning record. On Wednesday, Oct. 26, the Lakers notched a 2-0 victory over Gannon University at home to stay undefeated for the season.

Mercyhurst started the match full of determination to defend their home field as they began pushing the ball into their offensive third right off the bat. In the opening 30 seconds, sophomore midfielder Sean Kerrigan found sophomore Frank Lovett who put the ball in the back of the net to give the Lakers the lead. This was Lovett’s fourth goal of the season which came after his hat-trick last Saturday.

The Lakers kept their spirits alive by continuing to test Gannon’s defense. Sophomore Nic Munch took a shot in the 11th minute, but Gannon’s goalkeeper saved it. Senior Martin Grzywa tried his luck but shot high off frame.

Defensively, the Lakers put on a show as they held Gannon to only two shots throughout the first half. Comparatively, Mercyhurst had ten shots and a goal to finish the first half.Three minutes into the second half, Kerrigan bested the Golden Knight defenders. He found some space and launched a shot that the Gannon goalkeeper had no chance to save. This goal extended the Lakers’ lead to 2-0 and gave Kerrigan his 18th goal of the season.

As the game pressed on so did Mercyhurst as they kept shooting. Sophomore Riley Kutschbach took a shot but it was saved in the 83rd minute. There was no problem for the Lakers as they held on to their lead to finish the game 2-0. The Lakers carried this energy and determination through their last regular season game of the season against Slippery Rock as they dominated them 4-0. The match against Slippery Rock started off as a battle with a lot of back-and-forth play.

The Lakers started to gain momentum as they created scoring opportunities.Sophomore defender Nic Munch scored in the 24th minute to give him his eight goal of the season and Mercyhurst a 1-0 lead.

Julius Becker got in the action with a pass from Munch and a successful shot against the Rock’s goalkeeper to extend the Lakers lead to 2-0 to end the first half.Mercyhurst’s defense kept Slip-pery Rock from taking quality shots on goal and gave some solid on ball pressure that caused the Rock to scramble. Meanwhile, the Lakers offense continued to perform as Dylan Sumner scored in the 48th min-ute to give him his ninth goal of the season.

The final goal of the match was scored by Martin Grzywa in the 82nd minute to create a final score of 4-0. The win against Slippery Rock gives the Lakers a 17-0-1 record to end their regular season, which was their first season in program history being undefeated. They also gained a conference record of 10-0 which clinched them the first spot in PSAC West.

With a near perfect record to end the regular season, the Lakers will carry on to compete in the PSAC semifinals on Friday, Nov. 4.