St. John’s soccer rolls through St. Joesph’s in weekend clash

The St. John’s soccer team kept its good start to the season going with a lopsided win against. 

As the Queens, New York area was all dealing with Hurricane Henri this past Sunday, the St. John’s soccer team got out of town just in time to take on the Saint Joseph Hawks in Philadelphia.

The game was a tale of two halves as the Red Storm were able to get a couple of chances at goal in the first half, creating five shots and forced two saves out of Hawks goalie Nicole Cappelletti.

However, the match was still scoreless at halftime.

Saint Joe’s created two shots and forced Naya Lipkens into a save in the first half.

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The second half was an entirely different story as the Johnnies would score five goals after the break to secure a 5-0 win on the road and a 2-0 start to the season.

The scoring was started in the 55th minute by forward Zsani Kajan who scored on a low shot off of a pass by redshirt junior Kayla Mesaros.

Kajan would add two more goals, one was a beautiful curling shot into the top left corner and the other would be a penalty kick, to seal her third career hat-trick in a matter of 12 minutes.

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Sunday’s performance already takes Kajan’s goal tally past her Spring 2021 total of four. Her five goals in the first two games of the campaign earned her Big East Offensive Player of the Week honors and brings her career total to 33 with the Red Storm, five goals short of third place on the St. John’s all-time scoring list.

Senior defender Samantha Gordon would add two goals late with the first coming in the 76th minute as she received a cross from Jadyn Rupnow and then slotted it into the Hawks net with a low shot to the back post.

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Gordon finished off the game in the 88th minute as she took advantage of an error by the Hawks’ defense. Gordon’s original shot would get cleared off the line, but the clearance went right back to her and the goal was a simple tap-in.

After the two big wins to start off the year, the Red Storm will now return home to take on Columbia on Friday, August 27 at 6:00pm EST on ESPN3.