The St. Louis Cardinals took a page in drama from the Saint Louis University Billikens men’s soccer team, Virginia Commonwealth University and SLU entered the field of battle on Friday night, hollywood could not have scripted this game, the drama, the “never say die” attitude of SLU proved they would be the victor on Friday Night.
“I hope the fans feel like they got their money’s worth,” Head Coach Mike McGinty said, “It was not the way we wanted it, it’s not the way we drew it up in the gameplan, but I’ll take it.”
The game started off like any other game, both teams fighting back and forth for position and possession. It was VCU who broke through in the 15th minute as VCU’s freshman and previous Atlantic 10 freshman of the week Devon Fisher tallied the first goal of the game as VCU took the early 1-0 lead. However, the theme of the night quickly developed, as the Bills would respond to VCU goal.
After the VCU’s first goal, the Bills decided to attack, after a few minutes of planning and fending off VCU’s attacks, SLU’s Marco Heskamp charged down the field like a horse who broke from the starting gate at the Kentucky Derby, Heskamp gave the left back defender a move and then sent the ball into the box where SLU’s Kingsley Bryce deflected the ball into the net to tie the game at one a piece in the 26th minute.
However, VCU’s Jason Johnson a mere minute later, in a fury charged down the field breaking through the SLU defense and notched his ninth goal of the season putting VCU back in on top 2-1 in the 27th minute.
The next ten minutes for the Bills was emotionally draining for the Bills as they had many near goals. Most notably, Alex Sweetin sending a ball into box and Robbie Kristo headed just passed the far post. After that ten minutes, the Bills had to settle by taking at 2-1 deficit into halftime.
The second half tested the Bills’ will by every stretch of the imagination, the Bills were more aggressive in the second half, but could not convert on anything, that was until the 90th minute.
Kristo fell to the pitch, and the clock was stopped with 15 seconds left in the match. Kristo had to come off the pitch as the Bills planned their final attack of regulation. It is was up to freshman midfielder David Graydon to send the ball into the box. Graydon kicked the ball and the clock ticked away. In the ensuing mob around the ball, the ball fell into the middle of the mob and SLU’s Raymond Lee kicked the ball about 2 feet away from the goal and knocked it in with 8 seconds to spare for the Billikens which sent the crowd at Hermann Stadium into a frenzy.
“We had an incredible comeback, I mean we’re a family and we act like a family,” Kristo said.
However, the comeback was not complete, after the first overtime period, VCU came out and attempted to attack, but they were deflated much like the Washington Nationals as the team could not mount an attack in the second overtime period, and then the golden goal occurred Heskamp sent the ball up to Kristo who passed it off to Sweetin who then passed it back to Graydon to then passed back to Kristo who was cutting down the middle of the VCU defense and from the right side fired a shot toward the far post and in for the golden. Kristo ran to far side of the grandstands where he was greeted by his teammates who jumped on top of him to celebrate the end of the dramatic match.
This match now gives in the Bills a 2-1 conference record. The team has now defeated their third nationally ranked team this season, the second nationally ranked team they have beaten at home. The Bills are now 8-3.
“It feels amazing [to score the golden goal], but I didn’t do it by myself it takes the whole team, it’s a process, you have Sweetin running down, Jon Roeckle, Graydon cutting people up in the the box, it was the easiest thing for me, I just touched it in,” Kristo said on his golden goal.
The Bills will against Richmond at 1 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 14 at Hermann Stadium.
