Game 13 – Wednesday, Oct. 20 @ 2:30 p.m.
Eastern Illinois (4-8, 1-3 MVC) hosts Bradley (6-7-1, 1-2 MVC)
Eastern Illinois hosts Bradley for a Missouri Valley Conference midweek contest. The Panthers and Braves enter the match tied for fifth in the MVC standings with three points each. Evansville, a team the Panthers play next week, is also tied with three points. The Panthers need to secure points against one or both of those teams in order to try and lock up a spot in the MVC Tournament which will take the top six teams. EIU trails the all-time series with BU, 12-8-1, but did split with the Braves last season with each team winning on its home pitch.
Head coach Adam Howarth is in his 11th season as the head coach for the Eastern Illinois men's soccer program. A former EIU player, Howarth has compiled a 78-100-19 career mark with the Panthers. Howarth has compiled a 19-56-8 record in the Missouri Valley Conference.
Junior Ryan Child contributed to both of Eastern Illinois goals last week as he had the game winner at Central Arkansas and followed up with an assist against SIU Edwardsville. Child now leads the Panthers with seven points as he has two goals and three assists this season. His goal against Central Arkansas ended an EIU drought of 431 minutes without a goal.
Sophomore Kyle Bullock notched his second goal of the season on Saturday against SIU Edwardsville and it proved to be one of the fastest goals in recent EIU history. Bullock found the back of the net just 4:11 into the match. The last time EIU scored in less time than that was Sept. 7, 2008 when Alex Harrison scored against IPFW just 3:31 into the match. The 2008 season had four EIU goals scored in the opening seven minutes of a match with the quickest coming by Adam Gartner at 2:46 into the season opener against Valparaiso on Aug. 29.
Senior goalkeeper Sean Molony currently ranks among the nation's best in the net in terms of save percentage. Molony enters the week ranked 16th in the nation in saves per game at 5.42 while his save percentage is 20th at 85.5 percent. Molony also ranks in the top quarter of the goalkeepers in the nation in terms of goals against average with his 0.91 GAA ranking 54th in the NCAA and 3rd in the Missouri Valley Conference.
Eastern Illinois will make a national television appearance on Friday, Oct. 29 when the Panthers play a Missouri Valley Conference match at Evansville. The match will be aired on Fox Soccer Channel with a live 7 p.m. kick off. Fox Soccer Channel is available on many sports packages offered by cable companies. It is channel 149 on DISH Network and channel 619 on DirecTV. In the Coles County area, Consolidated Communications offers FSC on channel 37 (of its expanded sports package) while Mediacom offers it on channel 261 (of the digital plus package).
