With only a few games left in the regular season, the Central Arkansas men’s soccer team will travel to Louisville for a conference match against Bellarmine on Saturday at 6 p.m. CT.
Central Arkansas (3-7-2, 2-0-1 ASUN) recently faced No. 25 SMU in a non-conference game, which they lost. The team had previously secured an important 5-2 victory over Lipscomb at home last Saturday, where four different players scored, including two goals from Maxim Sheenkov. After conceding the first goal, Central Arkansas responded with five consecutive goals, including four within a 15-minute period during the second half.
Reflecting on the recent win, head coach Kyle Segebart said it was “the culmination of months of work.” Under Segebart’s leadership in his first year, the team has worked to find offensive consistency and had scored in six straight matches prior to their game against SMU, with multiple goals in each of the last three matches.
Bellarmine (7-3-2, 2-1 ASUN) comes into Saturday’s match after a narrow 1-0 non-conference win over IU Indy on Tuesday. Alex Halevy scored in the 12th minute for Bellarmine, and that goal was enough to secure victory in an evenly contested match.
The Knights’ only conference loss this season came against Central Arkansas earlier in the campaign by a score of 2-1. In that meeting, Bellarmine managed just seven shots after scoring early and struggled offensively for much of the game.
Johan Nissen-Lie has been Bellarmine’s top scorer and leads both his team and the ASUN conference with seven goals this season. However, after netting five times across four matches before conference play began, he has scored only once since then—during a win over Queens. When Bellarmine last faced Central Arkansas, Nissen-Lie was limited to just one shot—the lowest total he has recorded against any ASUN opponent so far this year.
Saturday’s match between Central Arkansas and Bellarmine will be available to stream on ESPN+, with live statistics provided online.
