Concordia men’s soccer season ends with 1-0 loss to Hastings Broncos

Sophomore defender Michael Wyvill (5) looks to get open to receive a pass.

Photo credit: Josiah Seabaugh

By Cohen Carpenter

On a frigid Wednesday night matchup, second-seed Concordia was handed just their third loss of the season, this time a 1-0 defeat in the Great Plains Athletic Conference championship to fifth-seed Hastings College.

The grand finale of the conference season, against one of the more storied programs in recent GPAC history, was a rematch of an early-September bout, in which the Bulldogs tied the Broncos with a late second-half equalizer off the boot of senior Martin Herrera. Unfortunately for the Bulldogs, that equalizer never came Wednesday night.

The goal that ended up icing the game came in the 25th minute—a Lewis Albert header assisted by Juan Artega-Lopez found its way to the back of the net. Hastings’ 1-0 lead proved insurmountable, and despite Concordia out shooting the Broncos six to five, none of those scoring opportunities resulted in a tie game.

The Concordia offense did look livelier as the game progressed. By the second half, Concordia maintained longer possessions and were able to keep the ball on Hastings’ half of the field.

“First half we didn’t have a ton of chances,” said coach Jason Weides. “Not a lot of shots on goal. I think the biggest difference was that [Hastings] was playing very direct and were winning every first ball and every second ball. And what we did was try and press up a little higher so we could disrupt that service and put them under more pressure – we did a good job of that in the second half. That allowed for shorter possessions for them and allowed us to get on the ball faster and have more opportunities.”

Unfortunately for both the Bulldogs on the field, and the healthy number of Bulldogs fans that weathered the sub-50-degree temperatures to support their team, those opportunities, as the final score indicates, failed to result in a goal.

A noticeable trend that developed as the night went on was the amount of jump balls that were effectively cleared by Hastings. As time started to dwindle down, Concordia sought to float the ball in the box to create more scoring chances.

“I think at the end, [Hastings] is good in the air—that is a strength for them,” said Weides. “I think we are also pretty decent in the air, but they just outplayed us in that regard… if you can’t compete and win that first ball, you have to win the second, which is something we did well with in the second half. But in those last moments, those last 10 to 15 minutes, they’re getting all 11 people behind the ball… In those moments you need a touch of quality, which we didn’t have enough of tonight.”

Despite the end result, the Bulldog offense did keep Hastings on their toes, especially late. Herrera and senior D’Andre Williams both had two shots apiece and constituted the most imposing scoring threats throughout the night.

On the defensive side, while goalkeeper Nolan Fuelberth might not have put up the bigger stats he was used to throughout the season, the junior did have an incredible leaping save, his only of the night, that prevented the game from getting out of hand at 2-0.

All in all, the championship loss marked a sour end to what had truly turned into a remarkable regular season. With the Bulldogs breaking the GPAC record for ties in a season, Concordia kept their conference regular season unbeaten streak alive, a record which now stands at 20-0-10 dating back to 2022.

“Our mantra this year was ‘be now,’” said Weides. “Be in this moment, not at the last moment, not in a future moment… I’ll remember this team as having really embodied that mantra, they leaned into that and no matter what happened—with the nine ties, which might be an [National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics] record—they kept focus… We would address something with the team, and they would grow and get better. This team constantly grew together. Our culture grew, a championship culture was blossoming within this team. That’s why it’s painful to see this come to an end. But hopefully when we look back in a couple of years, we will have seen that this team laid the foundations for the culture for next year and for teams in the future.”

One team’s triumph is another’s anguish. As Hastings celebrated the reality of a NAIA national tournament berth, Concordia confronted the reality of a season over too soon, a single blemish on an otherwise unbeaten conference record that now stands to define their season’s outcome.