Contact: Sam Fretto, Athletics Communication Graduate Assistant, sjfretto@noctrl.edu
NAPERVILLE, Ill. (Oct. 8, 2025)- With the remainder of the regular season going against College Conference of Illinois & Wisconsin (CCIW) foes, the North Central College men's soccer team hosted the Augustana College Vikings in a midweek clash inside Benedetti-Wehrli Stadium. After 90 minutes of aggressive play from both sides, the Cardinals (5-1-5, 1-0-1 CCIW) came from behind to draw with the Vikings (3-4-3, 1-1-1 CCIW) 2-2.
41 seconds into the match, Augustana was given a yellow card, which led to an Aleks Duncevic shot that missed out of play. The Cardinals dictated the pace of play, remaining on the attack for much of the first half with shots firing off the feet of Will Mayer, Lorenzo Monticelli, Jay Umana, and Marco Costabile over the span of 15 minutes.
Momentum swung in favor of the Vikings as a 37th-minute shot from Duncevic saved by Augustana led to a Vikings' counterattack. In transition the Vikings played the ball ahead and found goalkeeper Daniel Szalai out of place, but before Augustana could fire off a shot, Caden Arguelles intentionally committed a foul. Arguelles was assessed a red card for his denial of an obvious goal-scoring opportunity. Ultimately nothing came of the Vikings' free kick.
Despite being down a player, the Cardinals got on the board at 40:49 after the North Central defense cleared an Augustana attack and played it ahead to Joseph Sargent. Receiving the ball near midfield, Sargent turned on the jets, beating four Viking defenders and playing the ball past a diving goalkeeper selling out for the ball. The ball slowly rolled into the net from 18 yards out for Sargent's ninth goal of the season.
A pair of yellow cards were pinned on Augustana to close out the aggressively played first half.
The equalizing goal was promptly scored by the Vikings coming out in the second half. In the 48th minute, a free kick was sent over to Augustana's Diego San Pedro, as he snuck his shot by several Cardinal defenders and by a diving Szalai. The go-ahead goal by the Vikings was scored just minutes later at 54:30 as they brought the ball ahead to the Cardinals' zone and played a through ball into the center of the 18-yard box, where Aron Sjoberg tapped the ball to the left of Szalai to make it 2-1.
The Augustana lead was not maintained for long as the Cardinals set up for a corner kick in the 56th minute. The corner led to a Cardinals throw-in off a missed shot, and Lucas Laird fired a cross into the middle, which was deflected by Augustana to the foot of Griffin French. French's shot was saved and deflected right to Sargent with a wide open net; he evened the game 2-2.
North Central continued to play on the attack despite being down a man. In the final stages of the match, Duncevic, Laird, Sargent, and Carter McMahon were all looking for the game-winning goal but failed to capitalize.
The Cardinals fired 27 shots to the Vikings' 11, while North Central had 10 shots on goal. Despite just two Augustana shots on goal, they made them count, scoring on both while saving eight Cardinal shots. Sargent scored his ninth and 10th goals of the season while capturing a point in CCIW play as they sit with four in two CCIW matches played.
Up next for the Cardinals is a Saturday showdown with the Elmhurst Bluejays (4-6-2, 1-1-0) inside of Benedetti-Wehrli Stadium on Oct. 11. Kickoff is set for 1:30 p.m.
