INDIANAPOLIS - On Thursday in Cedarville, Ohio, the Men’s Soccer Championship semifinals will kick off on the campus of Cedarville University, who earned the top overall seed and right to host the postseason conference tournament.

In the first game, #1 seed Cedarville will take on the #2 seed Alderson Broaddus. Seeding is broken up by divisions, making Cedarville the top overall seed and the #1 seed from the southwest division of the G-MAC. AB is the #2 seed from the northeast division, behind Davis & Elkins.  

Alderson Broadus advanced out of the quarterfinals with a win over #3 Kentucky Wesleyan (SW Division), 1-0 on a goal by Peter McMenemy in the 68th minute. During the regular season, Cedarville traveled to Philippi, West Virginia and captured a 1-0 win, coming on a goal by Christian Alexander. In goal, Paulo Pinto and Ethan Dewhurst combined for the shutout, each playing 45 minutes.

Alderson Broaddus will look Deshawn Parker and Marco Purfumo who lead the scoring attack for the Battlers. Parker leads the team with eight goals, while Purfumo leads the way with nine assists. Both player lead the team with 21 points each. In goal, Ricard Lao played in all 18 games, totaling 1620 minutes and allowing only 24 goals. He made 85 saves on his way to a 8-9-1 record, which includes three shutouts.

Cedarville, who is riding a four-game winnings streak coming in, will rely on the duo of Connor Gilmour and Christian Alexander. Gilmour leads the team with 14 goals and 32 points, while Alexander also is in double-figures with 10 goals and 24 points. Connor Scott leads the team with six assists and is third with 12 points. In net, it has been a balancing act for the Yellow Jackets as Paulo Pinto has made 12 starts and played 757 minutes, and Ethan Dewhurst has made six starts, but played in 16 games and totaled 875 minutes. Combined they have allowed just 15 goals. In conference action, Dewhurst has doubled up the amount of time in goal and is 5-0-1 compared to 2-0 for Pinto.

The winner will advance to face the winner of the second semifinal game between #1 Davis & Elkins (Northeast Division) and #3 Salem International (Northeast Division), who advanced with an upset win over #2 Trevecca (Southwest Division) in the quarterfinals. The game went into double-overtime before Salem scored the game winner and moved on with the 3-2 victory.

In the regular-season, the two teams split their games against one another, each time the road team earned the victory. In their first meeting, Salem International shutout D&E 3-0 in Elkins, WV. The Tigers had goals from Tomas Szabo, Alexandre Costet, and Dominic Gillespie, while Eliott Cook made ten saves in the shutout performance from the netminder.  

In the second meeting at Salem, the Senators held on to the 2-1 victory. Dominik Zych and James Pucci each scored to give D&E a 2-0 lead with just under 35 minutes left. SIU cut into the lead with a goal by Jan Deters in the 85th minute, but it wasn’t enough.  

For the two teams, D&E’s offensive attack will come from Pucci (eight goals) and Lukas G-Puppendahl (six goals), while Salem will look to Michael Brunton (seven goals) and Mohamed Bakayoko and Tomas Szabo (six goals each).

The winners will advance to the G-MAC Men’s Soccer Finals on Saturday in Cedarville, Ohio at Cedarville University at Noon.