By WWU sports information staff
The Western Washington University men’s soccer team scored three first-half goals, including a pair by junior forward Christian Rotter two minutes apart, to lead the Vikings to a 3-0 shutout victory over Northwest Nazarene University Thursday evening in Great Northwest Athletic Conference action at Bellingham.
Rotter, an Auburn Mountainview alumnus, recorded his first career multi-goal game and has scored his three goals this season in the last four games.
in addition, Rotter was one of 11 Vikings selected to the GNAC All-Academic Team. Rotter holds a 3.82 GPA, the highest on the team, and is majoring in manufacturing and supply chain management.
With their second consecutive shutout victory, the Vikings moved into a second-place tie in the GNAC standings at 4-4-1 (13 points) in conference play and improved to 8-6-1 overall. NNU dropped to 3-11-1 overall and 3-6-0 in GNAC play with its sixth consecutive loss.
“I thought we did well from the start. We were very organized defensively and capitalized on the opportunities we created,” said WWU coach Greg Brisbon. “In the second half we did a good job of keeping possession and being patient as we went forward.”
The game was scoreless through the first 19 minutes of the contest, before Rotter blistered the NNU defense for a pair of goals 2:03 apart. His first goal came at the 19:59 mark when sophomore midfielder Drew Farnsworth threaded a pass through the NNU defense to Rotter, who chipped the ball over the goalkeeper from 16 yards out.
Just over two minutes later at the 22:02 mark, Rotter took a diagonal pass from sophomore midfielder Georg Cholewa and blasted the ball from 12-yards out that caromed off the NNU goalkeepers hands and trickled into the goal.
Junior forward Ryan Schaefer added to the lead in the 33rd minute when he took a long cross from Cholewa in the middle of the box and tapped home his third goal of the season.
The Vikings remain at home, hosting rival Seattle Pacific on Saturday with kickoff at 7 p.m. at Harrington Field.
VIDEO: See online.
