After an unexpected yet sturdy 6‒2 Atlantic 10 campaign by men’s soccer, head coach Craig Jones and his first-place Colonials were recognized by the conference with a host of accolades Wednesday.
Jones was named A-10 Coach of the Year, a week after GW women’s soccer head coach Sarah Barnes took home the same award, while junior forward and GW leading scorer Garrett Heine was named to the All-Conference First Team.
Junior defender Tobi Adewole, sophomore forward Christian Lawal and senior goalkeeper Jack Lopez were also named to the All-Conference Second Team, and graduate student Matthew Scott and junior Sam Summerlin earned All-Academic team honors.
Picked this preseason to finish 10th in the Atlantic 10, the men’s soccer team completed its dark-horse regular season run Saturday, clinching the conference’s regular season title and a No. 1 seed in the A-10 championship for the first time in three years with a 1‒0 win over Saint Louis.
Jones is the second men’s soccer coach to earn the honor, following former head coach George Lidster who was named A-10 Coach of the Year three times in 24 seasons, and most recently in 2011.
After three years of losing records in conference play, this will be Jones’ first trip to the postseason as head coach. The 10-win season to which the GW alum guided his team this year was the program’s best since 2011, when the Colonials reached the A-10 championship final.
Heine leads GW with nine goals and four assists on the season, and is currently the third-leading scorer in the A-10. The San Diego native’s six game-winning goals, the most recent of which came off a penalty kick in double-overtime Saturday, are also the fifth-most in the nation and the most by a Colonial since 2008.
Adewole and Lopez are part of a GW defense that allowed a league-best four goals in A-10 play, and recorded seven shutouts overall, tied for most in the league. Adewole played the second-most minutes on the team this year, and even added one goal and two assists from the backline.
Through 10 games, Lopez has posted a 0.68 goals against average and 0.821 save percentage in his final year on the squad, good for second and third-best in the A-10, respectively.
Lawal, sidelined by injury to begin the season, has recorded four goals and three assists in 15 games. The team’s second-leading scorer also earned Atlantic 10 Player of the Week honors this October.
Scott, who is pursuing a master’s degree in international trade and investment, has a 3.78 GPA which helped him receive his second consecutive All-Academic nod. Summerlin, a finance major, has been recognized on the A-10 Commissioner’s Honor Roll in all four of his collegiate semesters and currently boasts a 3.85 GPA.
And while the four All-Conference First and Second Team picks are the most for GW since 2001, the Colonials are still searching for even greater success in the form of an A-10 postseason title.
That quest begins Thursday at 11 a.m. in Fairfax, Va. when No. 1 GW takes on No. 8 VCU in round one of the A-10 Championship.
On Oct. 24, the Colonials recorded their first-ever victory over the Rams in a 1‒0 decision at VCU.
