Sebastian Missura

The Wittenberg men's soccer team has gotten mixed results through the first few weeks of the 2004 season, but the North Coast Athletic Conference schedule still lies ahead with potentially good things in store there. Going into a Saturday afternoon non-conference match-up against Cedarville, the Tigers are 3-4 overall.

The season opened with a 4-0 loss to NAIA scholarship program Ohio Dominican in the first round of the Wittenberg Invitational on Sept. 4, but the Tigers rebounded with a 4-3 defeat of NAIA scholarship program Notre Dame College in the consolation game the next day. In that game, sophomore Sebastian Missura (Quito, Ecuador/American School), the team's top scorer a year ago, turned in his first hat trick, scoring the winning goal with about seven minutes left to play.

A week later, the Tigers defeated Rose-Hulman 2-1 but lost to DePauw 1-0 on a trip through Indiana. On Sept. 14, Wittenberg defeated Urbana 3-2 before losing a pair of games in the Wilmington Kiwanis Classic over the weekend by scores of 1-0 to Transylvania and 3-0 to nationally ranked Wilmington.

Missura leads the Tigers, who have been outscored 15-9 on the season, with five goals and 12 total points, totals that also pace the NCAC currently. Freshman Evan Ingram (Columbus, Ohio/Watterson) has added three goals and seven total points, and freshman Bryan Lopes (Dublin, Ohio/Coffman) is tops on the team with three assists.

Defensively, the Tigers are very young, starting a variety of different players due to injuries. Sophomore goalkeeper Adam Horrocks (Delaware, Ohio/Hayes) has started every game in net and has a saves percentage of .720.