By Jake Bilyeu, PLU Sports Information Student Assistant

PARKLAND – The Pacific Lutheran men's soccer team fell behind early, but the Lutes bounced back with plenty of firepower to finish the weekend with a 5-1 win over Pacific Sunday afternoon.

The Lutes were given a striking scare moments after the game got underway, as Pacific's Matt Kimball sliced through the defense and netted a goal from 10 yards out in the second minute.

PLU controlled the pace from that point on, keeping the ball on the offensive side of the field and outshot Pacific 12-1 in the first half. Even so, it wasn't until the 44th minute that the Lutes finally broke through, when Todd Hoagland took a header from Troy-Mikal Oliger following a corner kick by Holton Halfaker and dropped it in from the left side.

PLU head coach John Yorke remained confident after his team gave up the early goal, as he said that "we were still on top of our game. We knew that if we kept good spacing and possession of the ball, we would be alright."

The Lutes maintained possession throughout the second half. This time, though, Pacific's defense couldn't handle the bombardment. PLU scored four goals on 14 shots in the period.

Rio Alcorta struck first for the Lutes in the second half off the assist from Suwilanji Silozi in the 50th minute. Twenty minutes later, Bennett Bugbee headed in a corner kick from Diego Aceves to put the Lutes up 3-1. Bugbee may have had a case of déjà vu after that header.

"We scored on them last year with the same play," Bugbee said. "We knew that they don't mark the near post very well, so I told Diego to make it happen and we did."

Shortly after the header, Halfaker put the game out of reach with a goal in the 77th minute. Eddie Na, who assisted the Halfaker goal, scored his third goal of the season one minute later, bringing the lead to 5-1.

After its quick start, Pacific couldn't muster a counter attack to answer the Lutes barrage. Pacific only managed to fire off two shots after their early score, both of which missed the goal entirely.

PLU improved to 5-2 overall and 2-0 in conference play, while Pacific fell to 2-5 overall and 0-2 in the NWC. Next weekend, the Lutes will travel to eastern Washington to take on Whitman and Whitworth, in "the hardest road trip of the season," according to Yorke. The team will go in confident, as Bugbee said, "now that we've got one week under our belt, we're ready for anything."