Box score

Springfield, IL – The Prairie Fire dominated on offense and defense and earned its first win of the season, 9-0, on Sunday against Robert Morris University at Springfield.

Seven different players scored for Knox (1-1), which shook off a tough 2-1 overtime loss in the team’s season opener at home last Friday against Spalding University.

The nine goals scored are the most for the men’s soccer program since a 9-2 win at home against Lincoln Christian University in September of the 2010 season.  The nine goal margin of victory and the goals scored by seven different players are the most in recent memory.

First-year Charlie Harned (Webster Groves, MO, Clayton) drove home the first of his two goals to open the scoring within the first 15:00 of the match.  He was assisted by senior Donald Tchopya (San Francisco, CA, Galileo Academy of Science and Technology), who also assisted on the Prairie Fire's second goal about 5:00 later by first-year Will McGowan (Andover, MA, Bridgeton Academy) to build a 2-0 lead going into the intermission.  Harned, besides his first two goals of the season, added an assist in the second half as well.

Prairie Fire junior Maxwell Gatyas (Plymouth, WI, Plymouth) scored a goal and had two assists after the break, when Knox scored seven more goals. 

Also scoring for the Fire were first-years Charles Edemba (Abia, Nigeria, Santana Rhetoric Institute) and Nathaniel Logie (Trinidad and Tobago, Queens Royal College), and sophomore Jacob Polay (Galesburg, IL, Galesburg).  Junior Demoz Desta (Chicago, IL, Gordon Tech) assisted on one of Tchopya's goals and first-year Hadee Ahmadi (Denver, CO, Martin Luther King Jr.) assisted on the first score of the second half by Gatyas.

Complete statistics from the match were not available from Robert Morris University.

Knox plays next on September 9 at Rockford College.

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