Kyle Keck | Echo
The Taylor men's soccer team garnered its first win of the season on Tuesday in a 4-1 victory over Robert Morris.
The match took place on the Trojan's home turf due to the game's cancellation in Illinois last weekend. Coming home gave Taylor time to learn from its 1-2 loss against Judson and provided the team with the beauty of home-field advantage. Senior Tim Daniels was well-aware of the adjustments Taylor needed to make.
"At Judson, we only played well for about 45 minutes," Daniels said. "Going against Robert Morris, we knew that we needed to stay focused for all 90 minutes."
The Trojans were focused from the start as Daniels netted a header goal in the first 41 seconds of the game from a ball sent in by senior Danny Cawley. The goal set an aggressive tone that ignited the rest of the team as freshman Sam Hardy added a goal of his own shortly after. Starting the first half with two early goals gave the Trojans a swagger-and they never let up.
"Going up early always gives us confidence," Daniels said. "But we still know that the game of soccer is long, and it is important not to sit back after scoring early."
Defensively, Taylor played hard-nosed soccer, controlling the majority of its possessions. Although Robert Morris was the first to strike in the second half, the Trojans made few mistakes. Freshman Gabe Partain was pleased with the defense's lock-down performance.
"Going into the game, the defense was told to not give up any shots off or on goal as we only allowed six shots altogether," Partain said. "Our mission each game is to not allow any goals scored. In this case, they got one on us, but we stepped up right away and made sure it wouldn't happen again. The defense, as a whole, played strong by not allowing many shots, which allowed plenty of time for our attackers to score some goals for us."
Recording its first victory of the season was exciting for Taylor, but the excitement was magnified for one of its midfielders. Freshman Sam Hardy scored his first collegiate goals in the Trojans home opener.
"It felt great. I was pretty pumped when it happened and was just really happy that I was able to contribute," Hardy said. "(Tim Daniels) is a very skilled player, so I knew that he would be able to get in a cross pass. I just wanted to make sure I got in the way of it to put it in. The second goal I just happened to be in the right place when the rebound came out to put it in."
The Trojans (1-1) face No. 7 Rio Grande in Ohio at 7 p.m. on Saturday. They will return home for the Taylor/IWU Invitational on Sept. 5 against Marygrove at 7 p.m.Photograph by Josh Adams
