DURHAM, N.C. – Coming off a regular-season CAA championship and NCAA Tournament appearance a season ago, the Elon University men's soccer team returned to the pitch for the first time in 2023 Friday. Elon had several opportunities but fell short to Furman in the John Rennie Nike Classic, 2-1.
Even after an offseason with a heavy roster turnover, Elon was still picked to finish second in the CAA. While ultimately falling short against Furman, the Phoenix showed flashes of potential for another successful season on Friday night.
Junior midfielder Scott Vatne scored Elon's goal in the 41st minute. From the left side of the field, Vatne buried the ball from over 25 yards out on a free kick, placing it perfectly in the upper right corner of the net to tie the match at 1-1.
Vatne's goal on Friday continued his streak of scoring in every season opener the Phoenix has played since his freshman year, all of which have taken place at Koskinen Stadium. All three goals have been Elon's first of the season as a team.
Head coach Marc Reeves believes that while his team fell short in several categories, the team's effort was a bright spot in the loss.
Transfer junior goalkeeper Tomasz Wroblewski also impressed in his first game with the Phoenix. The Poland native made several impressive saves, tallying a total of eight on the night. While new to the Phoenix, Wroblewski is no novice when it comes to time in gloves. During his freshman year at Lake Erie College, he totaled 51 saves.
Reeves said while the Phoenix gave up more shots than he would have liked, he liked to see how well Wroblewski was able to handle Furman's steady attack.
"Some were quite cleanly handled by him," Reeves said. "They're a big physical team as well. We did well on defending the set pieces again with Tomasz. Their two goals were well hit."
Despite the loss, Reeves emphasized that while the team was outplayed in several categories, it is important for them to remember that Friday's loss was not the end-all-be-all in a four-month-long campaign.
"That's the way we go into everything, we're trying to win games, and tonight that didn't happen but that's the great thing about college soccer, we get the chance to turn around and do it again on Sunday," Reeves said.
Senior captain Ben Rosenblatt echoed the messaging of his coach. While disappointed with the outcome for today, he said the team will refocus to play Jacksonville on Sunday.
"We can't get stuck on one loss," Rosenblatt said. "Especially because of the quick turnaround, we can change our record back to .500 really quickly. It's not a huge hit yet. We just have to move forward."
'Rising Phoenix' is a new student-led initiative to cover Elon Athletics. Through innovative content creation and storytelling, Elon University students will have the opportunity to highlight the moments, people and events that make an impact, leveraging the athletic department's various web and social media platforms for distribution. Follow Rising Phoenix on Twitter (@EURisingPhoenix) and Instagram (@elonrisingphoenix). Interested in joining this initiative as a content creator (video, graphics, writing, storytelling, or more)? Contact Jacob Kisamore at
jkisamore@elon.edu.
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