NORFOLK, Va. - Lewis Rourke scored his ninth goal of the season with 30 seconds remaining to equalize the game against James Madison as Old Dominion earned a 1-1 draw on Senior Night at the ODU Soccer Complex.
“Really disappointed not to get all three points tonight with that performance,” said ODU Head Coach Tennant McVea. “We talked about capitalizing on long periods of dominance this week and tonight we didn’t do that.”
“I’m so proud of the effort to get back into the game,” said McVea. “We are going to need to go on the road and give it everything this Tuesday to earn our spot in the conference tournament. But, we have been here before, and we know what it takes to get it done late in the season.”
Old Dominion (10-5-1, 2-5-1 SBC) trailed by one goal with a minute remaining. After a foul was incurred by a JMU (7-5-4, 4-1-3 SBC) defender, ODU’s Michael Dessalegn stepped up to take the free kick from near the halfway line. McVea instructed his Monarchs to push forward up the field to create chaos in the final third. Dessalegn whipped his delivery to the top of the box where Noah Dietze headed the ball backwards to Otu Bisong. Bisong found Rourke with a pass right in front of goal.
The Nottingham, England native headed the ball towards goal but a strong hand by JMU’s Erik Jaspers parried the ball away. But, Mile Zivkovic was in the area, anticipated the rebound, and fed Rourke again right in front of goal. This time, the fourth year forward on senior night headed the ball to the bottom left hand corner and squeaked the ball past Jaspers to level the game. Neither side could create a scoring opportunity with 30 seconds left and the Monarchs earned a point.
The Monarchs conceded in the 71st minute to go down 1-0. Chris Niblock received the ball on the right wing and cut inside on his dominant left foot. He struck the ball hard and true and rattled the bottom of the bar to score James Madison’s opening goal.
Old Dominion had a flurry of chances in the opening 45 minutes, the Silver and Blue finished the opening stanza with eight shots to the Dukes’ one. In the second half, JMU picked up the pace and had seven shots to keep up with ODU who still ended the second 45 with a +3-shot advantage (10). ODU outshot the Dukes, 18-8 over the 90 minutes and took 11 corners including seven in the first half. James Madison had four corners total, all of which came in the second half.
ODU’s Bisong tried to open the scoring in the first seven minutes of action but his shot was palmed away from danger by Jaspers. Rourke and Jason Purks had chances saved by Jaspers three minutes in between each other. Rourke fired a low driven shot from inside the box in the 26th minute that was parried away, and Purks tried to curl his shot into the back of the net but Jaspers positioned himself well to make the clean catch.
David Chapman, Miguel Menendez, Dietze, and Rourke all played the full 90 minutes. Barrett Saul and Purks led the team with four shot attempts each. All three of Rourke’s shot attempts were on net and forced Jaspers into making the save.
Logan Bellina made his third consecutive start in goal for the Monarchs and made two saves in the effort. Jaspers played 90 minutes and made seven saves to deny the Monarchs.
UP NEXT:
Old Dominion heads to Huntington, West Virginia, to take on Marshall on Tuesday, Nov. 3 at 7:15 p.m. in the final game of the regular season.