Mercer University
Lipscomb
Bears Down Lipscomb 2-1 in 2OT to Earn Spot in A-Sun Championship
11/9/2013 12:00:00 AM | Men's Soccer
NASHVILLE, Tenn. – In a must-win situation to make its sixth-straight appearance in the Atlantic Sun Championship, the Mercer men's soccer team pulled out a 2-1 double overtime comeback win over Lipscomb on Saturday evening at the Lipscomb Soccer Complex.
Sophomore Juan Jose Morales scored the game-winning goal in the third minute of double overtime to make Mercer (5-13-1, 3-4-1 A-Sun) the No. 4 seed in next week's A-Sun Championship.
With a tie earlier in the evening between Jacksonville and Stetson, Mercer needed to pick up a win against the Bisons to advance to postseason play and head coach Brad Ruzzo knew it.
"At the end of regulation I got our guys together and simply said all year long we have been dealing with adversity through injuries, tough schedule or difficult results and we could make amends for all of that right here and right now," Ruzzo said. "I told them if you want to keep wearing that Mercer University uniform you need to find a goal here in the next 20 minutes and to their credit they kept fighting until the very end and pulled out the win."
Things didn't start out well for Mercer as Lipscomb struck in the opening minutes of the contest to take an early lead. Junior Omar Djabi scored on a free kick from just outside the box for his A-Sun leading ninth goal of the season to give the home team a 1-0 lead.
With the score still 1-0 at the start of the second half, senior Ryan King picked a great time to cue up his first goal of the season. A Bears long throw bounced around in the Lipscomb box before King ran onto it and smashed home a shot to tie the game up at 1-1 in the 51st minute of play.
Things stayed all square between both teams through regulation and the first overtime period. Everything changed for Mercer at the start of the second overtime session when the constant pushing forward offensively finally paid off.
King served a ball into senior Ehjayson Henry, who laid off a pass of his own to Morales who finally slipped a shot past Lipscomb goalkeeper Micah Bledsoe to secure the Bears 2-1 win.
Mercer goalkeeper Greg Ranjitsingh was brilliant in goal all night long; tying his career-high with 10 saves in the win. Ranjitsingh now has 252 career saves which moves him up into 19th-place for the most saves in a career in A-Sun Conference history.
Not to be outdone was the record breaking evening senior defender Joey Heavner put together. Heavner assisted on the Bears first goal of the contest to give him 23 assists in his career, making him the all-time leader in career assists in Mercer program history. Heavner wasn't done there, however, as his start against Lipscomb was the 78th of his career, setting a new record for the most games started in a career in A-Sun Conference history.
Mercer now turns its attention to the first round of the A-Sun Championship as it takes on No. 5 seed North Florida in Fort Myers, Fla. on November 13. A time for the match will be decided by the conference office in the next couple days.
"Looking back on it now it's very impressive the way this team finished down the stretch," Ruzzo said. "We needed six points to get into the conference tournament and we were able to get them on the road against two of the top teams in our league which I believe speaks volumes about the make-up of our squad."
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