TEXARKANA, Texas – The #5 seed Louisiana Christian University men's soccer program has played the entire postseason shorthanded, using a grand total of four reserves over 290 minutes of game time including a penalty kick shootout to punch its ticket to the NAIA Tournament for the second straight season as back-to-back RRAC Tournament Champions after shutting out its third consecutive opponent in the title match versus #2 seed Xavier.
The Basics:
- Score
- #5 Louisiana Christian – 2
- #2 Xavier (Louisiana) – 0
- Records
- #5 Louisiana Christian (14-4-3, 9-3-1 Red River)
- #2 Xavier-Louisiana (14-4-1, 11-2 Red River)
- Series History
- Wildcats Lead 2-1-1 (62.5%)
- Winning Streak
- Wildcats (W1) | Gold Rush's Last Win: November 2, 2024 (1-0)
After a half in which neither side dented the scoreboard,
Lucas Lima provided the spark that would ultimately lead LCU to glory, drilling a beautiful ball through the mid-afternoon Texas air and into the goal off a pass from
Adrian Amoros Navarro in the 53rd minute.
Amoros Navarro, the RRAC Tournament MVP, put Xavier's championship hopes to bed for good in the final 60 seconds of regulation with an unassisted score that beat the keeper back to his post as he was trying to aid his offense during a last ditch effort to tie the match.
Rodrigo Silva's 2024 postseason run will go down in school lore, yielding not one single goal through three full matches, two overtime periods and against three of the top four clubs in the conference, a span of 290 minutes consisting of nothing but clean sheets while accumulating 11 saves.
The Cats enacted revenge on the Gold Rush, who had knocked them from the upper-half of the league into having to travel on the road for the Quarterfinals as the fifth seed when they lost the regular season finale in New Orleans.
For Head Coach
David Castillo, the win was a milestone one for his career as it was his 50th as the leader of the Wildcats, by far the most in school history with an overall mark of 50-24-13 (64.9%).
The men from Pineville had some of the highest moments in team history such as being ranked in the NAIA Top 25 for the first time ever on October 9 but have endured some crushing lows like a 3-0 setback at Williams Baptist or watching their 19-match home unbeaten streak snapped in a 6-1 reality check loss to LSUS on October 12.
Louisiana Christian was on fire out of the starting gates, rolling past Texas Wesleyan and USAO by a combined 7-1 margin at the beginning of the campaign before drawing then #16 and now #12 William Carey in Hattiesburg (1-1), their only time not winning on home soil all year.
The Wildcats then hit a brief rough patch, dropping its first contest by a 3-0 final in Walnut Ridge, Arkansas to Williams Baptist, followed by an easy victory over Wiley (4-0) and then tying their Red River Rivals from LSUA, 1-1.
A five-game winning streak soon provided relief to worried CenLa futbol fans, making quick work of Southwest-New Mexico (4-2) and Paul Quinn (5-1) before shutting out the next three victims; Jarvis Christian (1-0), Texas College (1-0), and Texas A&M-Texarkana (3-0).
Coach Castillo's group was in uncharted territory and on cloud nine heading into the pivotal top-30 showdown with the Pilots of LSU Shreveport inside
Wildcat Field as they had cracked the NAIA poll (#25) for the first time ever a few days prior.
The 2023 RRAC Championship Game rematch did not live up to the hype as seemingly nothing went right for the home eleven, suffering its worst loss of the NAIA era to their nemesis, 6-1.
The ship seemingly righted itself with a pair of wins over Huston-Tillotson (5-0) on Senior Night and Houston-Victoria (1-0), but two losses over their final four matches at TAMUSA (L, 2-1), OLLU (W, 2-1), NAU (W, 2-1), and XULA (L, 1-0) eliminated the possibility for an at-large bid and any margin of error they had.
Homefield advantage in the RRAC Quarterfinals, which seemed like a sure thing not long ago had been lost, and back to the Alamo City they went as the #5 seed to face off with #4 seed Texas A&M-San Antonio.
90 minutes came and went . . . nobody scored . . . the first overtime chugged right along . . . scoreboard remained dormant . . . another extra period commenced and yet the score still stood at 0-0.
A PK shootout, something the squad had never encountered in 27 years as a varsity sport, was now in front of them. First two student-athletes for both teams scored, then the two sides traded makes and misses, four straight goals put the tally at 5-5 so the next advantage was the winner. Being the road team, LCU shot first and missed . . . If the Jags made this next shot, the Cats season was over . . . luckily, Silva wasn't ready for his career to end yet. After makes by both
Thiago Lopes and
Gabriel Zuniga, TAMUSA's Eduardo Hernandez's shot went wide right, and the guys were off to the Semifinals.
To be the best, you must beat the best. The Regular Season champs, who have won every regular season matchup between them and denied them a title in 2022 were waiting in LSUS. For the second year in-a-row, the answers were found in the postseason as the Wildcats figured out the Pilots and knocked them out of the conference tournament once again.
You all know the rest, the Louisiana Christian Wildcats have repeated as the Red River Athletic Conference Tournament Champions and are heading back to the NAIA Tournament for just the second time in program history!!!!
The players, fans and soccer community will all find out their next destination on Saturday at 2 p.m. during the NAIA Selection Show, which can be viewed
here.
Follow the men's soccer program on Facebook (
@LCUMSOC), Twitter/X (
@LCU_MSOC) and Instagram (
@LCU.MSOC).
Follow the Wildcats on Facebook (
@LCUAthletics), Twitter/X (
@LCU_Wildcats) and Instagram (
@LCU_Wildcats).
#ClawsUp
