Conway – The Central Arkansas men's soccer team took to the pitch at the Bill Stephens Complex for the final time this season, playing host to Missouri State. After honoring the careers of seniors Jordan Bates, Brandon Wilde, Dylan Brog, Kayiraba Toure, Wes Carson, and Alejandro Moquete, the purple Bears secured the fourth seed in next week's Missouri Valley Conference tournament, taking down the maroon Bears 1-0.

"I can't put it into words how great it is to send these seniors out with a win," said UCA head coach Ross Duncan. "Those guys have been through three years, really four now, of just difficult moment after difficult moment, so to send them out that way, with a shutout and everything that goes into a conference win, is huge."

Central Arkansas (7-7-2, 4-3-1 MVC) controlled the ball early, putting up seven shots in the first 13 minutes of the match. After a short run of Missouri State possession that saw the maroon Bears put up two shots of their own, UCA found what would prove to be the match's only goal in the 28^th minute. Bates made a long throw into the MSU box, where it found the feet of sophomore Daltyn Knutson, who slid it to freshman Niklas Brodacki. The MVC's goals leader added another to his season tally, tapping the ball in from three yards out to put UCA up with his 13^th goal of the year.

"We're not known as a set piece team, necessarily, but we talked about set pieces, in the scout, as a means to attack," said Duncan after the match. "Missouri State, as we saw tonight, is a very tough team to break down, so we knew that was an opportunity for us. It was a bit of an unlikely source, coming off of the long throw, but it's something we've worked on, so it's always good to see that stuff work out."

Following the goal, Missouri State came to life, limiting Central Arkansas to just three shots over the remaining 62 minutes while putting up 16 of their own. The purple Bears were more than up to the task however, keeping MSU off the board to earn their sixth shutout of the year.

Central Arkansas put five shots on goal on the night, led by Brodacki, who was on frame with both of his shots. Carson, junior William Woody, and sophomore Christian Ilia each added a shot on target for UCA. In goal, freshman Marc Olsen made seven saves, more than a few of the highlight reel variety, to earn the clean sheet.

"You never don't want to score, if that makes sense," said Duncan. "But you knew, in the back of your mind that the game was going to tip one way or the other, and as soon as we scored that really fired them up and put us back on our heels a little bit. I would have liked to see a better response from us after the goal, just because we knew that pressure was coming.

"Marc was immense, and our two center backs were unbelievable again," said Duncan. "I've got to give the man of the match performance to Jordan, who was just fantastic tonight, on Senior Night. He won header after header, kept our guys organized, protected Marc for the most part, though Marc did come up big when he needed to, and it was just a special night for him."

The win, which pushed UCA's unbeaten streak to six matches and locked the purple Bears in as the fourth seed in the MVC Tournament, set up a rematch with Missouri State, who earned the fifth seed, on Wednesday evening at 6:00 PM.

"They're a team that we know better than anybody in the Valley," said Duncan of Missouri State, who Central Arkansas will be facing for the third time this season on Wednesday. "It's difficult to beat a team two games in a row, so we can't expect to put the same performance in that we did tonight and get the result we want on Wednesday. So we're going to have to find way to elevate our game in all areas of the field."