After opening the season with three straight shutouts, the Wayland Baptist Pioneers on Wednesday allowed two goals for the second straight match. Unlike the last time, though, the Pioneers were able to make up for it and earn the win on Wednesday afternoon at Hilliard Field, 3-2 over Our Lady of the Lake University.
"We're still figuring things out," Wayland coach
Cristhian Ospina said. "We're not playing as a team and still playing individually in a lot of ways. We have to fix that before conference."
Taking the pitch for the first time since falling to Columbia, Mo., and losing their No. 1 NAIA ranking, the now fourth-ranked Pioneers gave up a goal 13 minutes into Wednesday's match on a ball passed from way out that got headed by a Wayland player before being tapped in.
"We made a mistake on the back," Ospina said. "It's a good thing it was early in the game. We reacted well to it."
Did they ever!
The Pioneers scored a trio of goals within 25 minutes of each other, the first by
James Westfield in the 25
th minute. After
Reece Harrison's shot rebounded of the OLLU keeper, Westfield was there to put it in the net for his second goal of the season.
James Quinn logged his first goal of 2018 just five minutes later off a corner by
Adir Versano.
Then, with just over a minute left before halftime,
Alexis Castillo made it 3-1 with his first goal of the season, as well.
Federico Ucar set it up on a pass from the right sideline.
"Obviously we have to fix the mistakes, but to come out and score three in the first half after giving up that early goal was positive," Ospina said.
The coach said the Pioneers "came out a little bit flat in the second half" and "made things harder on ourselves."
OLLU pulled to within one with a goal after a rebound in the 53
rd minute. While the Pioneers weren't able to answer on offense, they were able to prevent the equalizer over the final 37 minutes.
With 10 different players shooting, Wayland held a commanding 19-5 edge, although the shots on-goal count was much tighter at 6-4.
Luis Almeida got off a team-high five shots for the Pioneers while Westfield had four, two of which were on-goal.
"We're really far from where we want to be," Ospina said. "We need to forget about the rankings and start playing more as a team and getting better. We have a lot of new guys, and we need to work twice as hard to get the results we need."
The Pioneers' next outing is at 6 p.m. Saturday against University of the Southwest. The match follows a junior varsity contest between the two schools at 4, which follows a women's match between WBU and Texas-Permian Basin at 2.
USW will enter Saturday's match with a 1-3 record, having lost to Ottawa-Arizona 3-2, to McMurry 3-1 and to Lubbock Christian in its last outing Saturday, 7-0. The Mustangs' win came over Arizona Christian, 4-3.
"They defend really well," Ospina said of USW. "They will try to score once or twice and then (slow the pace). We have to be really careful defensively and try to use our width to score on them.
"We have to approach the game like it will be the last game we play. We must stay humble because this team hasn't won anything yet."
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