No. 7 St. John’s Sinks Creighton, 2-0, to Stay Perfect in BIG EAST Play

Saturday, October 19

Omaha, Neb. (Morrison Stadium)

8 p.m. ET

St. John's University

12-1-0, 5-0-0BE

Creighton

6-5-1, 2-3-0BE

St. John's

Creighton

Tani Oluwaseyi took five of the team's 21 shots. Xavier had just five total shots all evening.

No. 7 St. John’s Sinks Creighton, 2-0, to Stay Perfect in BIG EAST Play

10/19/2019 11:13:00 PM | Men's Soccer

Box Score Box Score (PDF)

Tani Oluwaseyi scored his league-leading eighth goal of the season

By: Andrew O'Connell

OMAHA, Neb. (Oct. 19, 2019) – The No. 7 St. John's men's soccer team kept its best start in decades rolling on Saturday night, topping Creighton, 2-0, in front of more than 2,000 hostile fans at Morrison Stadium.

The Red Storm (12-1-0, 5-0-0 BIG EAST) maintained its position atop the league standings, staying two points clear of No. 13 Georgetown (11-1-1, 4-0-1 BIG EAST) in second place. The Johnnies and the Hoyas will square off on Wednesday night at Belson Stadium on the BIG EAST Digital Network.

St. John's, which checked in at no. 2 in last week's first edition of the NCAA RPI, recorded its fifth consecutive clean sheet and its ninth overall this season. The shutout streak is the program's longest since the BIG EAST Championship season of 2011, when the Johnnies rattled off six straight clean sheets in September. Jan Hoffelner made two saves to register his sixth win of the year while Luka Gavran tallied one save in the second half to preserve the lead. Eight of the team's nine shutouts have been joint efforts by the Red Storm's goalkeeping tandem.

Tani Oluwaseyi scored his eighth goal of the season, including his fifth game-winner, in the first half to give the Johnnies an early advantage that they would not relinquish. The sophomore, who leads the BIG EAST in both goals and points, is now the first St. John's player to score eight times in a season since Nelson Becerra accomplished the feat during the College Cup campaign of 2008.

Freshman Atila Ashrafi netted his second goal of the campaign in the 74^th minute of action, quelling a late Creighton push and sealing the St. John's victory.

The Johnnies last won 12 of their first 13 games all the way back in 1993, when the team claimed victories in 13 of its opening 14 decisions in the midst of a 21-game unbeaten streak that lasted the entire regular season. The last St. John's side to peel off five straight victories to start conference play did so in 2003, when MAC Hermann winner Chris Wingert led the BIG EAST Regular Season Champs to an appearance in the national championship game. The only St. John's team to win six or more to start conference play was the 1992 squad in Dr. David Masur's second year at the helm of the program. That team went a perfect 8-0-0 against BIG EAST opponents.

In five BIG EAST games this season, St. John's has now outscored the opposition by a 14-1 margin. All 14 of those goals have been unanswered since the Red Storm behind 1-0 to Xavier in its league opener on Sept. 20.

The win was the first for St. John's in four opportunities all-time at Morrison Stadium, a venue at which the Bluejays have a winning percentage of better than .800 dating back to its opening in 2003.

After Hoffelner turned aside the first shot of the game in the seventh minute, St. John's went on the offensive. The Johnnies recorded corner kick opportunities in the 11^th and 15^th minutes, the latter of which resulted in Matt Forster sending a shot just wide of the right post.

Following another Forster chance that missed wide in the 25^th, Oluwaseyi broke the scoreless deadlock with a brilliant individual effort in the 26^th. The sophomore picked the pocket of a Creighton defender in the Bluejays' zone before dribbling into the box and sending a right-footed strike into the upper 90 beyond the reach of goalkeeper Paul Kruse.

Oluwaseyi nearly made it a pair of first half goals in the 39^th minute, but Kruse managed to make a stop at point-blank range. The Johnnies got two more looks at the cage off of Oluwaseyi's first shot, but a Niko Petridis try was deflected before a subsequent shot by Brandon Duarte was cleared off the goal line by a Creighton defender.

Leading 1-0 at the half, St. John's nearly moved ahead by a pair in the 54^th minute when Oluwaseyi sent a header on target that Kruse somehow redirected, deflecting it wide and preserving the one-goal deficit.

Following Kruse's heroics in the cage, the Bluejays (6-5-1, 2-3-0) came out on the front foot, controlling possession and recording their best looks of the game. The Red Storm held tough; however, highlighted by a game-saving effort from Tiago Teixeira in the 65^th minute to deny Creighton a wide-open look at the goal.

Less than 10 minutes later, Ashrafi sealed the deal in the 74^th. Jared Juleau began the sequence, sending a cross from the left side to the back post for Oluwaseyi. Oluwaseyi headed it into the six-yard box toward Skage Simonsen, but a Creighton defender poked it out to an open space near the top of the 18. Ashrafi swooped in and blasted the loose ball past Kruse, putting the Johnnies ahead by a pair late.

Wednesday's match against the Hoyas, who defeated Maryland and Xavier this past week, will decide first place in the league standings with just a few conference games remaining. The game has the potential to be the first all-top 10 regular season match at Belson Stadium since Sept. 26, 2008, when the No. 4 Red Storm defeated No. 5 Connecticut, 3-1.