GREENVILLE, Pa. – Rallying in their third overtime period in two days, the Baron soccer squad finished off Thiel College in a 5-4 win after 100 minutes of play thanks to freshman Leo Herrmann's third goal of the game.

It took Franciscan 46 minutes to score their first goal. Down 1-0 at the half, the green and gold regrouped to play a completely different game in the second half, beginning when freshman Leo Herrmann beat a defender to a ball from midfield and put FUS on the scoreboard.

Despite Thiel's more physical style of play and adept ball movement, which enabled the Tomcats to regain the lead in the 50th minute, the Baron defense did enough to win.

Herrmann made good again this time on a build-up play from the midfield to tie the game at 2-2. The score continued to bounce back and forth with a penalty kick conversion by Baron junior John Imbimbo again tying the game at 3-3. Then, down 4-3 with under ten minutes left, sophomore Joseph Duran found junior Edwin de St. Aubin who put the ball in the net to push the game into overtime.

"When you're in a game like this you're always tense," head coach Ward Rogers said. "But we never had the feeling that we didn't have a chance because in large stretches of the game we were controlling the ball very nicely. Every once in a while there were some critical turnovers where we seemed to make a mistake in a bad spot of the field. When we make those mistakes it creates a chance for the other team."

Rogers said the secret to eliminating those mistakes is practice.

"The system that we're playing is highly dependent on ball control, so we're stringing a lot of passes together," Rogers said. "It's just making good decisions at critical times. As we play more games, we'll become more comfortable and those decisions will come more naturally rather than trying to force the ball."

Despite these growing pains, the Barons continued to take advantage of offensive opportunities and functioned well as a unit.

"It feels a lot better than in previous seasons. The start of this season is very positive," Rogers said.

The most exciting moment of the day came once again from the feet of Herrmann who scored within the first 20 seconds of OT to win the game. The freshman's hat trick was part of four goals the freshman forward has scored in his first two NCAA games.

"Leo has had a very positive impact on the team," Rogers said. "More importantly, the team plays very well around him. We have a good support system that's helping us create opportunities to score and Leo's finishing them. It's a team effort."

Rogers said that as his team comes off the high of their first win of the season, they will need to continue to work hard to improve their game.

"We need to work on our ball control, and optimize our system," Rogers said. "If we can eliminate those mistakes we seem to make at a critical point, we can probably make it a little easier on ourselves."

Now 1-0-1, the Barons hope to continue improving as they travel to Waynesburg for their next game on September 2 at 8:30pm.