Sept. 22, 2013
UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. - Freshman Mark Wadid (Mississaugua, Ontario) netted a goal in the 65th minute of action to lead the Penn State men's soccer team to a 1-0 victory over Duquesne on Sunday afternoon at Jeffrey Field. Wadid has now tallied three game-winning goals for the Nittany Lions.
"We knew it was going to be a hard match with this Duquesne team," said PSU head coach Bob Warming. "They close the ball well, they're physical and they play your body instead of the ball a lot but I thought we did a good job. The good news was that we got to play a lot of guys too. We have a tough stretch ahead of us so we needed to get some other guys in the game and I was happy the performances of some of the guys that came in."
The Blue and White improve to 4-2-1 on the season and have not given up a goal in two-straight matches.
Penn State had a handful of chances in the first half including an early attempt by Owen Griffith (Lewisburg, Pa.). Griffith had a straight-on look at the goal from 18 yards out in the seventh minute but could not capitalize as Duquesne keeper Sam Frymier collected the save.
Jordan Tyler (Rochester, Mich.) also came close in the 19th minute after the Lions were awarded a corner kick. Grant Warming (Omaha, Neb.) played the kick to Tyler, who then attempted a header from six yards out that went high.
The Dukes made their first attempt in the 24th minute as Alex Healion made a play from 25 yards deep. The sophomore was unsuccessful as the ball sailed high of the net.
Martin Seiler (Stuttgart, Germany) had a great opportunity four minutes into the second half after PSU was given a free kick. The senior took the shot from 20 yards and nearly scored but the ball went just high. Seiler got another chance in the 63rd minute and this time the shot came on goal but his efforts fell short as Frymier made an impressive diving save.
Wadid finally got the Nittany Lions on the board at the 64:32 mark. Redshirt junior, Eli Dennis (Easton, Md.) played a through ball to the freshman, who gathered the pass before firing the ball into the net from eight yards out to give Penn State a 1-0 lead.
Duquesne attempted to counter in the 73rd minute as Kadeem Pantophlet put up a header but was stymied by PSU keeper Andrew Wolverton (Atlanta, Ga.), who made a beautiful diving save to preserve the clean sheet. Wolverton collected two saves en route to his 19th career shutout.
The Nittany Lions travel to West Virginia on Wednesday for midweek match-up. The game is slated for a 7:00 p.m. start.