Coro: 'Dream' win for GCU, Jackson

Thursday, September 7

Phoenix, Ariz.

7:00 p.m.

Grand Canyon

1-3

Evansville

4-1

Evansville

Grand Canyon

9/7/2017 10:18:00 PM | Men's Soccer, Paul Coro

Box Score Photo Gallery

Niki Jackson's envisioned goal, defense's shutout net win in front of 3,506 fans

By: Paul Coro

Niki Jackson was living the dream Thursday night.

Sleeping on the eve of his senior season's Grand Canyon home debut, Jackson dreamed big with a vision of scoring the winning goal. It was his reality in waiting. Jackson sent 3,506 GCU Stadium fans off to a night of sweet dreams with a header that lifted the Lopes a 1-0 victory against Evansville.

The Lopes picked up their first win while handing Evansville its first loss, thanks to the defense posting a shutout, Jackson's goal in the 75th minute and the extra defense of Havocs students surrounding the stadium field.

The fans were put through heart palpitations as Lopes redshirt freshman Jeremy Pollard and the crossbar staved off Evansville chances, including a brilliant cross-body deflection by Pollard only about a minute before Jackson's goal. That helped lead to a potential Jackson breakaway, but he was grabbed for an Evansville yellow card that set up GCU senior teammate Alex Ramirez's free kick in front of the Lopes bench. Ramirez sent the ball low and upfield as Jackson, in the box, read that an Evansville defender was mistiming his header jump.

The grazed ball flicked to Jackson, who headed it into the net from 8 yards away to set off the "Grand Cannon" and give him three goals in four games.

"I had a dream that I scored," Jackson said. "I didn't know how I'd score but I knew I'd score. I thought I'd get two but one works."

Jackson celebrated by running along the goal line, bringing back the cartwheel and back flip that he used for freshman- and sophomore-season openers but had been absent from when he ranked third in the nation with 16 goals as a junior.

"Now that we finally got the momentum going, winning this game against a tough team that was 4-0 is really going to bring the momentum into our next game (7 p.m. Sunday) against (No. 23) Pacific," Jackson said.

The Lopes opened the season with two frustrating overtime losses and a 3-1 loss at Wisconsin before Friday's home debut. GCU coach Schellas Hyndman said early-season changes affected the team but switching to a 4-5-1 on Friday eliminated Evansville's free midfield action and set up the Lopes to win late-game balls.

"I thought the game was more physical than it needed to be but we didn't back down and played hard," Hyndman said. "I thought we had a lot of heart. If we had 3,500 fans, 3,498 were GCU fans. I'm glad we got a win to excite them to come back."

Pollard was the co-star with an array of saves, including a diving first-half deflection on an Evansville set piece that was grounded from 20 yards. Lopes senior Aidan McGlothan cleared out the rebound chance, as he also did on a Purple Aces second-half threat to preserve the shutout. GCU also had shut out No. 14 Creighton in regulation last week before falling in overtime.

"I haven't had that much activity even in practice," Pollard said. "Defensively, we played better as a team. The past few games, we haven't been playing as a compact unit. The midfielders and the back line definitely played more as a team and our communication was better."

This time, the Lopes had the Havocs on their side -- all sides. The GCU students filled "The Platform" to the east and throughout the north and south berms. They were as creative as ever with ballerina skirts, a cut-out soccer ball for a helmet and a purple flamingo. Hecklers packed behind the Evansville goalkeeper. Freshman Jared Cassell wore a dolphin costume that his parents warned him not to buy last Halloween because he would only wear it once. A student who Jackson only knows as "Z" celebrated his goal nearly as much as him.

"That's the best student section I have ever seen in the country," said Pollard, the Australian who transferred from Akron. "Nothing compares to that. I would hate to be an away team playing here."

Follow Paul Coro on Twitter: @paulcoro.