Lehigh Opens Patriot League Play with Road Win Over Loyola
BALTIMORE – For 45 minutes, Lehigh were hanging on. For the next 45, they took control.
The Mountain Hawks shook off a sluggish first half and punished Loyola Maryland with two second-half goals to claim a 2-0 win at Ridley Athletic Complex on Saturday afternoon, opening their Patriot League campaign with three points on the road.
Head coach Dean Koski didn’t sugarcoat the opening spell.
“I thought we struggled in the first half to be consistent with the way we wanted to play, but we regrouped at halftime and thought we came out in the second half with better intentions,” the Ingrassia Family men’s head soccer coach said. “We did a better job of creating chances in the second half and did a good job defensively of shutting them down.”
Kinnunen keeps Lehigh alive
Loyola carried the early threat. The Greyhounds outshot Lehigh 6-2 in the first half and dictated much of the tempo, but junior goalkeeper Anton Kinnunen refused to budge.
He turned away three efforts before the break, the key reason the sides went into halftime locked at 0-0. Loyola probed, Lehigh bent, but the Mountain Hawks’ last line held.
By the numbers, Loyola finished with a 15-10 edge in shots and a 5-2 advantage in corners. On the scoreboard, it never mattered.
Turker breaks through, Robertson kills it off
Whatever was said in the Lehigh locker room at halftime, it landed.
Lehigh’s attack finally sparked to life just after the restart. In the 48th minute, junior Bora Turker pounced for his first goal of the season, finishing off a move created by junior Aiden Gonzalez and first-year Alex Junquera. The Mountain Hawks had their breakthrough and, just like that, the tone of the game flipped.
The pressure didn’t fade. With Loyola chasing, spaces opened and Lehigh struck again.
In the 65th minute, senior Thomas Robertson doubled the lead, notching his second goal of the season and giving Lehigh a cushion their defensive form richly deserved. From there, the Mountain Hawks managed the game with composure, shutting down Loyola’s attempts to rally.
Kinnunen added one more save after the interval to close out a four-save day and his third straight shutout. It was also the seventh clean sheet of his career, another marker in a growing résumé.
“Our backs and Anton are in sync with each other,” Koski said. “I like our mentality and we’re defending better in the box. And when we need Anton to make a save, he’s been there and he’s been sharp.”
Confidence growing, test looming
Lehigh moves to 1-2-3 overall and 1-0 in Patriot League play, while Loyola drops to 1-6 and 0-1 in the league. The record only tells part of the story for the Mountain Hawks, who have now stacked three consecutive shutouts and, in Koski’s eyes, absorbed some important early-season lessons.
“No game has been easy, and I think our guys have learned a lot early on this season,” he said. “We had good confidence going into this game and we’ll have a better confidence coming out of it.”
That belief will be tested quickly.
Lehigh returns home on Saturday, September 19 at 6 p.m. for its Patriot League home opener against Army, a side Koski knows will not arrive quietly.
“We’re glad to get three points on the road, but we know that every game is going to be a challenge for us,” he said. “We’ve got a big game next weekend against Army at home. They’ve had a good start, so it’ll be a good challenge.”
A road win, a clean sheet, and a growing backbone. Now the question is simple: can Lehigh turn this defensive steel into a sustained Patriot League surge?
