Chicago, Ill. - The Wheaton College men's soccer team scored the first two goals of the game and held on to beat North Park University 3-1 on Saturday.

The Thunder improved its record to 4-6-3 overall, 2-0 in CCIW. The Vikings fell to 6-3-1 overall, 1-1-1 in conference.

Early in the match, Stephen Mesko was the catalyst for the Thunder attack. The senior attacking midfielder dribbled through and shed double teams time after time. The rest of the team kept pace, showcasing quick, accurate passes that provided good looks at the goal.

#Jordan Golz just missed a flick-on header that was saved in the 12th minute while Dan Pavlak#'s header off bounced off crossbar in the 13th minute.

In the 16th minute, North Park goalkeeper Tim Ahlberg came off the goal line to stop a cross in front, but he lost the handle on the ball. Mesko happened to be right in front of him and cranked a left-footed bullet into the back of the netting to give Wheaton the 1-0 advantage.

The next scoring opportunity came in minute 26 when Chad Musgraves was taken down in the box and Wheaton was awarded a penalty kick. Drew Golz put enough pace on his blast to score the goal.

North Park got on the board only three minutes later. Filip Lindmark made an impressive run on two defenders and slotted a left-footed shot to the right corner of goal.

As the game wore on, the pitch became much more physical with a total of 56 foul calls. Seven yellow cards were given out, with five going against the Thunder.

In the second half, the Vikings brought wave upon wave of attacks. North Park used its speed and skillful dribbling to set up plays, expertly moving off the ball and making plays in space. Wheaton focused on mounting counter attacks and keeping the Viking attackers in front of them at all times.

With only a minute left and still down one goal, North Park took a free kick from its own territory. Instead of booting the ball down to the opposing box, defender Hannes Granlund played the ball back to his nearby goalkeeper, who then touched back to Granlund on a run. But when the ball played too far ahead of Granlund, Drew Golz came roaring in and stole the ball. He then went one-on-one with the goalkeeper and fired the clinching goal to make it 3-1.

"It's a huge win," Wheaton head coach Mike Giuliano said. "But emotionally, the biggest part of it is they were another team that was really taking it to us to try to tie it late and they didn't. It's huge that we could sort that out like that. It also makes us 2-0 in conference. So I'm feeling good about our possibilities, but we have a long way to go."

North Park held a 20-16 shot advantage and 4-3 corner kick lead. Wheaton goalkeeper Ryan Seager turned in a big effort with six saves - including a couple point blank stops - to get the victory. Ahlberg made seven saves in taking the loss.

Wheaton continues conference play at Carthage College with a 7:30 PM game on Wednesday.