PICTURED ABOVE: Senior Noah Anthony recorded two goals in the National Championship Match.

Kansas City, Mo. – The Thunder men's' soccer team valiantly rallied, but lost the Final NCAA Division III Men's Soccer Match of the season on Saturday at the NCAA Division III Men's Soccer Championship Match. Tufts University won its first-ever NCAA Division III Championship in men's soccer with a 4-2 victory against the Thunder. The Jumbos gained a 3-0 lead early in the second half, but Wheaton rallied to cut the Tufts (16-2-4) lead to 3-2. A late goal by the Jumbos accounted for the final score of 4-2.

Wheaton ends the season with a 22-4 record. The 22 wins are the second-most by a Wheaton team in program history. Adam Blackman (PICTURED LEFT), Marshall Hollingsworth and Elliott Borge (PICTURED RIGHT) were selected to the all-tournament team.

Wheaton forced early pressure on the Jumbos with early shots. However, Tufts countered and collected a rebound shot that allowed Peter Lee-Kramer to score at the 27:11 mark. A foul was called against Wheaton inside the penalty box that setup a Tufts penalty kick that was converted by Nathan Majumder to put the Jumbos up 2-0 with 37:33 remaining in the first half. Tufts owned a 2-0 lead at the halftime intermission.

A Wheaton foul inside the penalty box setup a penalty kick by Gus Santos at the 49:11 mark of the match to increases Tufts' lead to 3-0.
Wheaton adjusted its formation at this point in the match. Head coach Mike Giuliano noted of the adjustment, "We changed formations at 3-0 and went to three defenders in the back and started to look a little bit more direct. That's not really what we want to do under most situations, but it certainly had a positive effect on the game."

A foul by the Jumbos in the penalty box allowed Wheaton to have a penalty kick opportunity and Noah Anthony converted the kick to cut the Tufts lead to 3-1 at the 53:34 mark of the match. Following Anthony's penalty kick, the momentum began to swing towards Wheaton. A flurry of Thunder shots culminated with an Anthony Goal at the 59:18 mark of the match. The Anthony shot on a rebound was assisted by Jordan Golz as the Thunder cut the Tufts lead to 3-2. Wheaton continued to attack the Tufts' defense with shots by Jordan Golz, Stephen Golz and Anthony in the 10 minutes after the goal. Giuliano stated, "At three to two we had three ridiculously good looks at goal, we just could not find the net."

At the 81:19 point of the match, Nathan Majumder of Tufts scored on a breakaway opportunity that was assisted by Jason Kayne to increase the Jumbos' lead to 4-2. Tufts closed out the match to earn the 4-2 victory. Giuliano reflected, "Once Tufts got the fourth goal things changed dramatically at that point. The formation change helped us a lot. We became a team that we don't really want to be, which is kick it long and see what happens, but it got us back in the game. There are not many teams that can be down 3-0 in the National Championship Game and fight that hard to get back in it. I am proud of them for that."

Giuliano (PICTURED LEFT) reflected, "My memory of this will be that the whole Kopion thing where we fight to utter exhaustion for a cause greater than ourselves was what these guys did today. I am proud of the way they fought back. It was just too big of a hole. We gave up two penalty kicks, both were good calls. We don't have any problem with the calls. The referee had no impact on this game and the game was won by the team that should have won it."

Wheaton attempted 18 shots in the match, with 10 on goal. Tufts had 13 shots in the match, with nine on goal. Wheaton was awarded nine corner kicks in the match and the Jumbos had three. Wheaton netminder Matt Paprocki allowed four goals and made five saves in the Thunder net. Scott Greenwood stopped eight Wheaton shots and allowed two goals.

Today's match was the final contest at Wheaton for Giuliano who announced in May that he was leaving to take a coaching and teaching position at Greater Atlanta Christian in Georgia. He stated, "I am leaving the greatest group of guys I have ever coached and the best position I have ever had. That is going to be hard, but I am thankful to do it for my family and for GAC.

Note Worthy: Wheaton is now 2-3 all-time in Division III Championship matches…Wheaton's three (1999, 2006 and 2014) Division III Runner-Up finishes is tied for most in Division III history with Washington University-St. Louis (1978, 1985 and 1987).