Spadine’s game winner keeps Dolphins afloat

Matthew Clark, Staff Writer
September 22, 2011
Filed under Sports

In front of a raucous crowd, Saturday afternoon, the Dolphins pulled out an exciting 3-2 victory over the St. Anselm Hawks. Coming off a Double OT thriller against American International, Le Moyne was riding a nice wave of momentum into the match.

Leading the charge was sophomore forward Michael Spadine, who, with two goals and one assist, now leads the Northeast 10 conference in points. Spadine got the ‘Phins off to a quick start with a goal five minutes into the match. Both Spadine and sophomore forward Zach MacNabb had chances to convert later in the half but neither were able to get the extra tally across. Despite an array of shots from both teams, combining to shoot 18 times, Spadine’s goal was the only one that hit and it lead to the Dolphins being up 1-0 at halftime.

One of the reasons the crowd was so animated was due to the physical play being let go by the game’s officials. St. Anselm finished with three yellow cards and 15 fouls, while Le Moyne finished with two and eleven, respectively. The play wasn’t all negative though as it led one Dolphin to say that the intensity was ratcheted up by the in-game aggression and made both teams that much more heated as well as competitive.

As the second half started flowing, it looked as if the Dolphins would run away with the match given how much the ball was dominated on their side of the pitch, but like what can happen in soccer, St. Anselm scored on its first opportunity of the half to tie the game at one apiece. If that fluke wasn’t enough, just two minutes later the Hawks got another goal off a completely accidental own goal by one of the ‘Phins.

Instead of folding following those two potentially back-breaking goals, Le Moyne stormed back and just two and a half minutes after St. Anselm’s goal, Zach MacNabb tied the score back up with a header to the back of the net off a deflection of Spadine’s shot that hit the post. Goalkeeper Matt Sliva was tried numerous times in the match and came up big when it mattered most with a tremendous save off a point-blank shot from inside the goal box.

Just a few minutes after that, Spadine provided the heroics with a goal following a great pass from MacNabb that put the Dolphins up for good 3-2. The goal was Spadine’s fifth in the season which puts him at second in the Northeast-10 leader board. The Dolphins are now 3-2-1 and more importantly, 2-0 in league play.  Le Moyne plays away  Saturday against Southern New Hampshire in another crucial conference game.