St. John’s soccer loses to Butler as postseason chase continues

St. John’s soccer narrowly falls to Butler as the fight for the postseason continues. 

Last Saturday, the St. John’s soccer team lost by a 2-1 scoreline to the Butler Bulldogs on the road.

In a rematch of last year’s Big East Tournament Quarterfinals where Butler took down St. John’s in a penalty shootout, Butler came from behind to hand the Johnnies its third conference loss of the season and seventh overall.

The contest started out so well for St. John’s when Antek Sienkiel converted a penalty kick for his sixth goal of the season with just a little over two minutes into the game.

The lead would not last long as Butler’s Jack Streberger equalized the score just a minute later.

The Bulldogs would dominate most of the first-half proceedings outshooting the Johnnies, 9-3.

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That domination would lead to the completion of a first half comeback as Streberger would score his, and Butler’s, second goal in the 36th minute that would ultimately be the winner in this contest.

The two goals by Streberger move him up to six tallies on the season.

St. John’s would flip the script of play and control the second half in search of an equalizer, but the Bulldog defense was able to hold firm and clinch the victory.

Butler is currently 4th in the Big East with a 9-5-1 (4-3-1 Big East) record with two games remaining.

St. John’s soccer battling for postseason spot

The loss ends a four-game unbeaten streak for the Johnnies albeit there was just one win in that span, and lone win came against DePaul on October 12. The rest were all draws to Xavier in a scoreless affair and a pair of 1-1 draws to Creighton and Providence.

St. John’s currently sits in 8th place in the Big East with a 4-7-4 (2-3-3 Big East) record on the season as its record currently puts them at nine points, just one point behind Creighton who holds the sixth and final postseason spot into the Big East Tournament.

In fact, the middle of the pack of the Big East is so tight this year that the gap between 3rd and 8th place is just four points.

The Red Storm have two regular season games remaining to gain some ground and secure a playoff spot, but they need other results as well to help push them to the right side of the postseason bubble.

St. John’s will take on UConn in their final regular season home game of the season on Saturday at 7:00p.m. before heading to Milwaukee on November 2 to take on Marquette in the finale.

St. John’s is 17-14-6 against UConn all-time and is unbeaten in the last four contests against the Huskies, not having faced defeat since they returned to the Big East.