HIGHLAND HEIGHTS, Ky. – The Northern Kentucky men's soccer team closed the regular season with a 3-1 win over Oakland on Friday afternoon at NKU Soccer Stadium. With the victory, NKU improves 7-10-1 overall and 3-5 in league play. Meanwhile, Oakland falls to 7-8-3 in all games and 4-2-2 against league competition.

"I thought we started off really slow," said head coach Stu Riddle. "We came out the gates firing and we needed to makes some adjustments formation-wise to get back into the game. The boys accepted that [and had] three great goals in the first half there.

"We've beaten the top two teams in this league. We need a little bit of help tonight but hopefully our season extends to Monday and beyond because we're just getting hot right now."

BETWEEN THE POSTS

• Baj Maan had three saves in 13 shots faced for the Norse and allowed the lone Oakland goal.

MATCH SUMMARY

• Both sides had near-scoring opportunities go awry in the early minutes. Two shots by the Golden Grizzlies hit the posts in the 12th and 16th minutes, while shots for NKU by Alex Greive and Rikard Lindqvist were saved in the 10th and 17th minutes.
• Oakland was first on the board with a goal in the 23rd minute.
• Following the Golden Grizzlie goal, NKU's offense made some adjustments and a scoring frenzy followed. At the 33-minute mark, Alex Willis dished from the right corner of the penalty area to Harvey Moyes, who sent a header into the goal to equalize the match.
• In the 38th minute, Greive crossed the ball over to Connor Probert in the midfield. Probert then dribbled the ball into the box and drilled a shot into the bottom-left corner of the goal.
• NKU completed the scoring tirade in the 41st minute when Probert delivered a free kick to Stian Jørgensen in the box for a header deposited into the goal.
• The Norse tried their hardest to further cushion the 3-1 lead in the second half. Greive and Willis each had solid chances to open the half with a score but they didn't pan out.
• Willis had two more on-target chances that were played to the bottom-right corner of the goal in the 78th and 79^th minutes of the match, but both were swept up by the keeper.

• The goal by Probert was his fifth of the season, which is tied for second best on the team.
• Jørgensen's goal was the second of his career and the fourth by an NKU defender this year.
• The Norse outscored their opponents 11-2 in the last three matches.
• Oakland is currently second in the Horizon League standings, the Norse have also taken down UIC, who has locked up the top seed in the Horizon League tournament.

UP NEXT

• The Norse will wait and see if three matches tonight pan out in their favor.  In order to reach the Horizon League tournament, NKU will need UIC to be Milwaukee, IUPUI to defeat Wright State and Detroit Mercy to pull off a win against Cleveland State.