St. John’s soccer defeats Stony Brook in high scoring affair

St. John’s soccer took down Stony Brook ahead of the start of Big East play this weekend. 

In a game that was just announced on Monday, the St. John’s soccer team defeated Stony Brook 4-2 on Tuesday afternoon in Belson Stadium.

The Red Storm have dealt with multiple scheduling changes due to coronavirus issues with its opponents as last Thursday’s game with Fordham hard to be postponed because of the pause across all of Fordham’s athletic teams.

Sunday’s game with NJIT was also postponed because of COVID-19 issues.

Overall, none of the Red Storm’s games have begun at their originally scheduled time so far this season.

Despite all the changes in the schedule, the Johnnies took care of business against Stony Brook in what turned out to be a surprisingly high-scoring game.

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St. John’s got off to a fast start in this game with three goals in the first 13 minutes, the first of which coming after nine seconds into the match.

Sophomore forward Wesley Leggett scored the extremely early first goal which is the fastest goal in program history. It was just three seconds away from the NCAA record for the quickest goal in a game, a record set back in 2008.

Junior midfielder Einar Lye would then draw a penalty and convert from the spot in the 10th minute and three minutes later Big East Preseason Offensive Player of the Year Tani Oluwaseyi would slot one home after picking the pocket of a Stony Brook defender.

The game at that point looked as if it was going to be an easy one that the Red Storm would dominate, but the Seawolves had other ideas.

Freshman midfielder Trevor Harrison would put Stony Brook on the board in the 26th minute, capitalizing on a mistake at the back from center-back Matt Chandler.

St. John’s soccer finds way to win after comeback attempt

Coming out of halftime with the score 3-1 in favor of the Red Storm, Stony Brook would control possession and had a couple of chances at grabbing a second goal. It eventually came in the 62nd minute through another Stony Brook freshman in forward Aki Solvason.

Just as soon as it looked like the Red Storm might be on upset alert, Tani Oluwaseyi would strike again just two minutes later, continuing his impressive start to season to give the Red Storm an insurance goal to close out the victory.

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Oluwaseyi now has three goals in just two games this season after he had 11 goals in 20 appearances in 2019. He also assisted on the Red Storm’s first goal of the afternoon.

The Red Storm will now begin Big East play on Saturday on the road against Seton Hall at 3:00pm EST.