After dominating at York Stadium on Saturday (Oct. 24), the No. 3 nationally-ranked York University Lions men's soccer team sealed a 6-0 victory over the Algoma Thunderbirds to move into first place in the OUA West standings with one game remaining.
 
In the first half, the Lions shared the ball in all areas of the pitch and successfully opened the scoring in the 14^th minute. Running onto a teasing pass given by Jonathan Lao (Unionville, Ont.), CIS leading goal scorer Michael Cox (Calgary) was able to find the back of the net with a shot to the bottom left corner.
 
A few minutes later the first-goal duo was back at it again to add a second goal to the score line. Meeting the ball in the air from Lao's corner kick, Cox headed the ball home to give the Lions a 2-0 lead. Then in the 34^th minute, Cox grabbed his well-deserved hat trick with a powerful run into the box and goal that found the bottom corner.
 
Adding another goal to the Lions' lead was Jarek Whiteman (Brampton, Ont.), who hit a spectacular ball from 30 yards out to bump up the damage and end the first half with a 4-0 score.
 
Coming into the second half, the Lions continued to dominate in the Thunderbirds' end. Cox grabbed his fourth goal of the game after muscling a defender off of the ball from a thrusting run forward and nailing the ball past the gloves of Algoma goalkeeper Nick Palazzi.
 
Then finalizing the Lions' 6-0 victory in the 87^th minute was Domenic Gullo (Newmarket, Ont.), who executed off of a rebound from Arthur Casupanan's (Niagara Falls, Ont.) long shot on net.   
 
In the next 24 hours the Lions will take a quick break before they host the Thunderbirds again back on home turf at 3:15pm. It will be a special game for the team's graduates, as they will be recognized for all of their hard work in representing York University over the past few years.