Storm ride fast start to win over Concordia-Moorhead

INDIANOLA, Iowa — Tanner Alderson scored the game's first goal less than a minute in and the Simpson men's soccer team never looked back, beating Concordia-Moorhead 3-1 in the final non-conference game of the season Sunday afternoon at Buxton Stadium.

The Storm (13-0-1) held Concordia to just six shots in the first 75 minutes on the way to matching the mark for the team's most wins during the Rick Isaacson era. Enrique Idehen headed in Simpson's second-goal just 6 seconds before halftime and Garrett Pochop converted a penalty kick in the second half.

Jake Potratz kept a clean sheet and made three saves in 74-plus minutes between the posts, improving to 12-0-1 on the year.

Jacob Schmidt scored the only goal of the game for the Cobbers (3-7-1), who were coming off a week-long break between games while Simpson was playing for the third time in the week.

Idehen took a high, bouncing serve off the foot of Jack Arndt to give Simpson a 2-0 lead going into the break. Pochop's penalty kick opportunity came as a result of goalkeeper Jackson Carr colliding with Tanner Alderson in the box in the 58th minute.

Quotes
"Scoring early for this team is important. We seem to settle in, relax, and play our best brand of soccer when we score early." — head coach Rick Isaacson

"Our back five have been outstanding, especially in the last few weeks. They've cleaned a lot up, they've gotten tighter and more stout defensively. We wouldn't be where we are now without the play of our back five." — head coach Rick Isaacson

"We haven't gotten a ton of shutouts, which isn't indicative of how well our defense has been playing. We've been playing solid and setting up our guys further up the field to take their chances, so it's been a really good all-around effort." — senior captain Nick Joslyn

News and Notes
• Simpson's 13 wins are tied for the most under seventh-year head coach Rick Isaacson, matching the mark set by the 2012 squad that finished 13-8-1. The school record for wins in a season is 16, set by the 1999 team and tied by the 2000 team in the program's only IIAC Championship season.
• Simpson held an opponent to one goal or less for the 11th time in 14 games this season. Simpson is 11-0 in such games.
• Pochop's successful penalty kick makes him 3-for-3 on the season and 5-for-5 on his career.
• Both halves of Division III's leading goal-scoring tandem (Alderson and Pochop) scored goals Sunday, marking the 17th-straight game that one of the two has found the back of the net for the Storm. You have to go back 23 games to a 1-0 loss at Central on Oct. 5, 2016 to find a game in which both were held without a goal or an assist.

Up Next
Simpson begins the home stretch of the season when it hosts Luther on Tuesday, Oct. 10. The Norse (6-3-2, 2-0 Iowa Conference) hosted Loras on Sunday in a contest postponed from Saturday. Entering play Sunday, both teams are undefeated in league play.