CAMBRIDGE, MA – Lesley University improved to 9-3-1 and 3-1-0 in league play with a 4-1 win over visiting Becker College in New England Collegiate Conference men's soccer play Wednesday night.
After the teams took a scoreless tie into halftime, Ari Sinanis (Guilford, CT/Guilford) broke a 1-1 tie with the eventual game-winner, and Ali Sozeri (Istanbul, Turkey/Miller School) later added his ninth and 10th goals as the Lynx won for a third time in four games. Jordan Santos (Middlebury, CT/Pomperaug) put Lesley on the board with his first career goal
Andrew Donnelly (Oxford, MA/Oxford) scored his first goal of the season for Becker.
The Hawks (2-10-2, 1-3-0 NECC) struck the best look in the early going, with Aldo Karkanjozi (Sterling Heights, MI/Stevenson) lining a one-timer just to the left of Lynx keeper Max Perkins (Lexington, MA/Lexington), who hit the turf for the lunging save at the 1:00 mark. It would be his only save of the night.
Just over 11:00 later, Santos landed Lesley's best attempt of the opening minutes, knocking a shot from the left corner of the keeper box just wide of the right post, leaving the teams in a scoreless tie.
Sozeri came even closer to breaking the tie, banging a shot off that right post at 28:08, but the teams went into halftime with a tie that didn't remain scoreless for long, thanks to the Lynx sophomore.
A sprinting Sozeri dribbled over the top of the Hawks defense down the right sideline and delivered a low cross from 20 yards in the right corner to Santos, who hammered the tiebreaking goal into the top left corner from inside the left post at 46:56.
The first time around, Lesley's lead lasted but minutes, as Becker's Donnelly tied the contest at 54:19, dribbling out of the right corner and connecting on a line drive into the top left corner of the net.
Sinanis answered, putting the Lynx up permanently at 63:39, netting an unassistsed score, his fourth of the season, in what would become the game-winner.
The team's leading scorer, Sozeri then took over in ensuring there would be no Hawks comeback. At 66:50, he ran under a long, towering Sean Randall (Fremont, CA/Washington) pass beating goalkeeper Tim McDonald to the first bounce and firing it into an open net. Sozeri added a bit of insurance at 67:48, taking a pass from Ahmed Abubakar (Springfield, VA/Robert E. Lee) and netting his 10th goal of the season from just outside of McDonald's reach.
For the night, Lesley outshot the Hawks16-9, earning the game's only two corner kicks.
Lesley University returns to play on Saturday at noon in NECC play at Southern Vermont.
