Keating's OT header lifts Lopes over Oral Roberts

Friday, September 22

Phoenix, Ariz.

7:00 p.m.

Grand Canyon

3-5

Oral Roberts

2-3-1

OT 2

Oral Roberts

Grand Canyon

Photo by: Travis Neely

9/22/2017 10:07:00 PM | Men's Soccer

Box Score Photo Gallery

GCU improves to 3-1 at home

By: Josh Hauser

PHOENIX - Charlie Keating's first touch on the ball went straight in the air. But when he landed back on the turf, he was facing an open net with the ball floating back within his reach. The second touch found the back of the net, and the Lopes topped Oral Roberts 1-0 in overtime from GCU Stadium on Friday night.

"I went up for it, got a touch on it, and no one stepped to me so I had an open goal to just put it away," Keating said, moments after another extended winning celebration over at The Platform with the Havocs. "It's so fun being with the Havocs. They stay to the end, even in overtime. That's almost two hours of soccer to watch. It's just fun to see our team work so hard to get the win."

It didn't come easy, however. GCU was without reigning WAC Offensive Player of the Week Damian German, while Niki Jackson played only 31 minutes.

"Not having Niki -- who's a great finisher and a good goal-scorer -- and not having Damian -- who's been really hot, we had to count on other people," head coach Schellas Hyndman said.

Without their top two goal-scorers, the playing field was tilted back to even, however, when Oral Roberts committed a red card in the 35th minute outside of game action. This gave GCU the 11-on-10 advantage through the final 65 minutes of regulation and into the overtime period.

Grand Canyon's offensive attack outweighed that of Oral Roberts with the Lopes firing off 25 shots compared to just 8 for the visitors. But the Golden Eagles defense, who was compacted backwards due to their disadvantage for much of the match, held stout through regulation.

"The opposition, a lot of times, will sit back on you," Hyndman said of teams forced to deal with a disqualification. "You have to break them down all the time. We just started working on more tactical training and I thought that helped us a lot today."

On his birthday, Josh Drack had a fair amount of good looks in the box but either had them saved by the keeper or had them veer off target. Drack finished the night with a team-leading 6 shots. After entering into the game late, Bennett Lehner had three shots including one on goal that missed. The Golden Eagles' goalkeeper, Thibaut Giquel, ended the evening with 10 saves.

Less than two full minutes into overtime, GCU broke through for its second overtime golden goal in the past three home matches. Drack took a corner from the left that was quickly cleared out of the box by the defense. The ball returned to Drack who promptly returned the ball to the box on a low cross, but it was punched out by the goalkeeper. Alex Radilla sent the ball back into the box, off the head of Khadim Seye, and into the vicinity of Keating. The goalkeeper left the box to dive at his first header attempt, leaving it vacated for Keating to end the match.

Another OT game-winner at home! This time it's Charlie Keating. #LopesRising pic.twitter.com/uqVSVOtwga
— GCU Men's Soccer (@GCU_MSoccer) September 23, 2017

The 1-0 victory marked the Lopes' second shutout win of the season. Jeremy Pollard ended the night with 3 saves, improving to 2-2 on the year.

"We really wanted to get ourselves away from giving up silly goals," Hyndman said. "I thought we played well that way, getting the shutout."

Grand Canyon improves to 3-1 inside GCU Stadium, a trend the Lopes look to continue as they head into Western Athletic Conference play next weekend. GCU will host the conference opener against Houston Baptist on Sunday, Oct. 1 at 7 p.m. MST.