BENNINGTON, Vt. – Captain forward Nick Haggerty netted five goals, the first four came in a nine minute span, to tie a Southern Vermont College school record in a 5-2 victory Saturday over the Elms College Blazers. This serves as a pivotal New England Collegiate Conference win for the Mountaineers (5-7) who improved to 1-2 in NECC play.

“We came into the game knowing we needed a good result to keep us in a good position for the post season. We’ve had a couple tough losses in there, so today’s result was very important for us.”

The two teams came out strong defensively playing to a 0-0 deadlock until 27:35, when freshman Doug Whitman setup Haggerty with his first goal of the day. Haggerty connected scored only minutes later (30:45) when he lofted it over a jumping Elms (0-10-2, 0-3-1 NECC) keeper from just outside the 18 on a nifty pass from freshman standout Cohen Bond to make it 2-0. In the 33rd minute of play Haggerty completed the hat-trick when junior Ben Naaktgeboren flicked it to him on the right side for an easy score. Four minutes (36:15) later Chris Hanson and Naaktgeboren once again setup Haggerty for another score to make it 4-0 in an amazing nine minute scoring surge by SVC.

“Nick [Haggerty] was absolutely brilliant today. He took it very personally that we weren’t scoring or creating many opportunities. The last week in practice he’s been really pushing himself and his teammates to be better to get us out of our goal-scoring drought.  Today you could really see what makes him a great striker: he consistently finds himself in positions to score, and he makes the most of his opportunities. To be honest, I’ve never seen anything like this:  five goals in a game is absolutely incredible, and the fact that four of them came within nine minutes of each other is that much more impressive.”

After the break Elms started to put more pressure on the ball and held back the Mountaineers from scoring. In the 64th minute of play Bond flicked it to Haggerty who netted it from five yards out. The Blazers finally broke thru the SVC defense with 68:37 on the clock as senior Chris Silva notched an unassisted goal past a diving Mountaineer keeper. Elms kept chipping away and in the 76th minute junior Sean Moylan scored on a nice cross from senior Sam Senecal to make it 5-2.

SVC goalie and captain Aaron Eschler got the win as he nabbed five saves on the day, while Elms keeper Ryan Sullivan scooped up four saves. The shots were evenly spread as each team had 14 apiece, but a 13-5 foul spread gave the Mountaineers an advantage in the aggressive NECC contest.

“Overall, I’m pleased with the team’s performance. Everyone worked hard, and without everyone stepping up, not one of those goals would have been scored today.  We still have a long ways to go this year, but I think this win can be a big step towards returning to the post-season. Momentum is very important at this level, and we seem to have that with us right now.”

Southern Vermont is back in action on Wednesday, October 13th, when it travels to MCLA for a non-conference game slated for a 4:00 p.m. start.