Second-Half Scoring Frenzy Sends Wildcats to NAIA Round of 16

BALDWIN CITY - Scoring three goals in the span of 11 minutes to start the second half, Baker knocked off No. 15 UC Merced with a dominating 4-0 victory in the 2024 NAIA Men's Soccer National Championship Second Round here Saturday night at Hartley Field.

With the win, the Wildcats advanced to the NAIA Round of 16 for the first time in five years where they will square off against No. 2 Oklahoma Wesleyan on Dec. 3.

Evans Osei Amankwah recorded his first career brace for BU with a pair of second-half goals barely eight minutes apart, putting one in just two minutes into the restart followed by a long-range bomb for the game's final goal to garnish the four-goal victory for the Wildcats.

Osei Amankwah finished with five points in the match after being involved in all three scoring plays in the second half, earning an assist on Reilly Marlow-Jones' goal.

As the 2024 Heart Newcomer of the Year, Marlow-Jones put on a brilliant display in his first postseason game after coming away with a couple of assists and scoring his 11th goal of the season.

Akira Itadani scored the lone goal of the opening half, collecting a nifty heel-flick pass from Marlow-Jones and blasting one by the Bobcats keeper to put Baker on the board in the 21st minute. Itadani and Marlow-Jones were two of Baker's three all-conference selections, joining defender Falco Dijkhuis on the Heart's postseason list.

Coming into the match as one of the three unbeaten teams left in the NAIA, UC Merced looked to gain control early on in the match, registering two shots in the first 13 minutes. Those shots went down as the only attempts for the Bobcats in the first half, while they were also held without a corner kick in the first 45 minutes of play.

Going into the half with a 1-0 lead, Baker came out with a scorching-hot start to the second half with Marlow-Jones sneaking a pass thru to Itadani in the box and the freshman midfielder then laying it over to Osei Amankwah who just had to tap it in for the first of his two goals.

Just three minutes later, a cross from Iwan Roberts ricocheted off the head of Osei Amankwah and over to Marlow-Jones who fired in the rebound to make it a 3-0 lead for BU.

Then, in the 56th minute, Osei Amankwah delivered the final knockout blow with a booming shot from the edge of the midfield circle that soared over the UCM goalie into the back of the net to quickly turn BU's one-goal halftime lead into a four-goal blowout early in the second half.

Goalkeeper Christian Villegas and the Baker defense earned their seventh shutout of the fall with Villegas finishing with four saves. They stonewalled a Bobcats offense that had only gone scoreless one other time this entire season.

With their last NAIA appearance and set of postseason wins coming back in 2019, the Wildcats advanced to the final site of the national playoffs for the first time since that 2019 team won a pair of opening-round matches over Eastern Oregon and Tennessee Wesleyan before falling in a double overtime heartbreaker to No. 2 Columbia.

Baker will take on an Eagles squad that boasts a 20-1-0 record with their lone loss coming against fellow Heart of America and NAIA Round of 16 team William Penn in the second game of the season. BU owns a four-match winning streak against OKWU with its most recent win coming back in 2022 when the Wildcats knocked off the fifth-ranked Eagles, 3-0 for the first-ever win at the newly-constructed Hartley Field.

The Wildcats' Round of 16 matchup will kick off at 10 a.m. on Dec. 3 at the Scheels Stryker Sports Complex in Wichita, Kan. A live stream of the match will be available on the Urban Edge Network.

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