Lehigh University Athletics
Lehigh places five on All-League teams; braces for tourney
11/9/2005 11:45:00 AM | Men's Soccer
“Any awards that this team receives are just that, a team award,” said a very pleased head coach Dean Koski. “I think for Adam, this is a great honor and a well-deserved one at that. As a wide mid-fielder, to be one of the top scorers in our league shows just how hard Adam has worked to earn this award.”
For Williamson, he joins Evan Bruno (’00 and ’02) and Andrew Mittendorf (’97 and ’98) as the only other Mountain Hawks in school history to be honored as the league’s Offensive Player of the Year. Despite drawing the opposition’s best defender on most nights, the Joining Williamson on the First-Team is Stevens, who developed into one of the league’s most potent offensive players this season. The 6’ 7” Stevens tied for first in the Patriot League with 20 points and nine goals, and tied for sixth in game-winning goals with two. Stevens scored two goals in back-to-back matches in mid-October, earning himself a spot on the College Soccer News Team of the Week, and also recorded a hat trick versus Helping to anchor Lehigh’s nationally ranked defense, O’Reilly also did his fair share of damage on the offensive side of things. The “I’m delighted for Jim and John to receive First-Team recognition,” explained Koski. “John had a great year for us, really solidifying our defense, but was also among the league-leaders in goals scored. For Jimmy, he was the leading scorer in the Patriot League with nine goals and really worked hard for this.” A 2003 All-League choice who returns this season, Classi finished fourth in Lehigh with two goals, and also handed out two assists. The psychology major scored the game-winning goal in the Mountain Hawks season opening win over Cornell in Verdi stepped his game up for Lehigh on defense and asserted himself as one of the leaders of that unit. Verdi drew the opponent’s best offensive player time after time, and did not disappoint with his performance. The junior helped anchor a Mountain Hawk defensive effort that shut out Colgate for the entire second half to give Lehigh the win on October 29, and preserve its perfect 6-0 record at the Ulrich Sports Complex in 2005. Verdi started all 15 games this year for the Brown and White, picking up an assist along the way, and was a major catalyst in Lehigh outscoring its opponents by a 28-11 margin. “I couldn’t be happier to see Peter and Joe both awarded for their play. They have both been quietly instrumental in our success this season, and although they may not show up in the stats very glaringly, they are both fixtures in the lineup that continually have produced positive results.” Koski and the Mountain Hawks will be making their sixth consecutive appearance in the Patriot League Tournament this weekend, and tenth overall. Lehigh will take on archrival Lehigh fell to On defense, Second-Team goal keeper Mike Tortora has had a great season for the Leopards, posting a goals against average of 0.90 and recording 60 saves in 1,393 minutes of action. In front of Tortora, Luke Sullivan garnered First-Team accolades, starting 16 games with three goals along the way. Friday’s game, along with all of Lehigh’s postseason action, will be broadcast live on lehighsports.com with streaming audio provided by Yahoo! Sports. Jeff Tourial will provide the commentary.
