Firebirds Earn Elusive First ECC Road Win at Molloy

ROCKVILLE CENTRE, NY – The University of the District of Columbia men's soccer team earned its first ever East Coast Conference road win on Wednesday afternoon, defeating Molloy, 5-2 on the strength of a hat trick by freshman Nenad Smiljanic.

The Firebirds (6-3, 1-2 ECC), who had not won a road game in nine tries going back to Oct. 17, 2011, tied a season scoring-high with five goals. Smiljanic's (Business Administration – Barnsley, England/Barnsley College) hat trick marks the second time a Firebird player has scored three goals on Molloy, with Adriel Garcia ('13) accomplishing that feat in a wild, 8-7 win over the Lions last year. With 10 games left to play this season, UDC has already tied last year's season win total of six. Molloy suffered its first ECC defeat this season as the Lions fell to 3-4-2 overall and 2-1-2 in league play.

Freshman forward Felix Angerer (Business Administration – Bayreuth, Germany/Graj Minster Gymnasium Bayreuth) started the Firebird scoring frenzy a little over 20 minutes into the action. Sophomore Elio Hernandez (Health Education – Germantown, MD/Northwest HS) dribbled the ball into the box and one-touched to Angerer, who fired a shot into the right corner of the net for his fourth goal of the season. Just a little over three minutes later, Smiljanic scored on a penalty kick for the first of his three goals on the day. The Firebirds allowed just one shot on goal in the first half and took a 2-0 lead into the intermission.

A little over five minutes into the action when play resumed, Smiljanic struck again, this time blasting a shot into the lower right corner of the net off of a cross by freshman Adam Spinks (Health Education – Birmingham, England/Fairfax HS). He would later add his second penalty kick goal and third goal of the afternoon (4^th of the season) in the 64^th minute to make it 4-0, Firebirds.

Junior defender Atunde Akum (Biology – Beltsville, MD/High Point HS) would get in on the scoring act just before the 68-minute mark, heading in a goal off of an assist from freshman Patrick Borchert (Business Management – Hagen, Germany/Hiedegardis Gymnasium) to make it 5-0, UDC. Akum now has four points this season from his defense position on one goal and two assists while Borchert, also a defender, has three points on one goal and one assist.

The Lions mounted a bit of a comeback late in the second half as Ryan Fackner headed in a goal in the 77^th minute and Tom Garcia scored in the 84^th minute, but it was too little too late for the hosts.

The Firebirds are back in Long Island on Saturday, October 5^th to visit ECC foe Dowling in search of their third straight win and first-ever back-to-back conference wins. Kick-off is at a 1 p.m.