Statesmen Win First-Ever Regular Season Conference Title with Result Against Graceland
William Penn University’s men’s soccer team celebrates its first regular-season conference championship in program history following a 2-2 tie against Graceland on Saturday, October 31st, in Lamoni. The No. 7-ranked Statesmen finished the regular season undefeated at 10-0-8 and claimed the Heart of America Athletic Conference title outright, earning the top seed in the conference tournament. (photo by Jordan Lester)
No. 7 WPU (10-0-8, 8-0-6 Heart), which started its soccer program in 1996, had won a tournament title (2024), but had never topped the conference regular season standings until Saturday’s result. The draw, coupled with Grand View defeating Missouri Valley, allowed the squad to take the crown outright.
Still undefeated through 18 games, the navy and gold will be the top seed in next week’s Heart Championship. On Wednesday, William Penn will host No. 8 seed Missouri Baptist at Drost Field at 7 p.m. WPU defeated the Spartans 4-0 back on September 4.
The victors started strong as Javier Perez (So., Alicante, Spain, Business Management) scored unassisted at the 3:13 mark.
Hector Bastos (So., Vitoria, Brazil, Computer Science) pushed the advantage to 2-0 when he also put an unassisted ball into the netting in the 30th minute.
Unfortunately, Graceland (10-5-3, 7-4-3 Heart) fought back with goals in the 66th and 78th minutes to force the tie.
William Penn held a 7-3 edge in shots in the first half, but was outshot 7-5 in the second period to finish with a 12-10 margin in its favor. Jarred Hendricks (Sr., Cape Town, South Africa, Exercise Science) and Max Mayer (Jr., Wendover, England, Exercise Science) matched Perez and Bastos with two shots.
Sil Milder (Fr., Arnhem, Netherlands, Sports Management) closed the night with four saves.
“Just…Wow!,” Head Coach Joe Minton said. “What an achievement, and nothing less than this group deserves. Sometimes you have to get over the line, however necessary, and we have crawled over it.”
