Three second half goals propelled the Saints to their first-ever national tournament win, a 3-2 victory over Boyce College, at the 2025 NCCAA DII Men's Soccer Championships in Pool Play on Monday evening at the Austin-Tindall Sports Complex.

In their first appearance at the national tournament since 2008, the fifth-seeded Saints scored all three goals in the second half and never trailed. With the win, Central Christian pushed its unbeaten streak to 17 straight matches.

After a scoreless first half, Central Christian (17-2-2) earned their first corner kick opportunity, and Richard Freitas placed a perfect ball to Israel Cobian, as the Saints scored the first goal of the contest in the 68th minute.

Boyce's Noah Lund would not allow the fourth-seeded Bulldogs (7-6-1) to go down quietly, as he scored his first goal in almost two years on a laser from outside the box to tie the contest 1-1 in the 78th minute.

Just 119 seconds later, Central Christian's Gage Walker found himself open in the box shortly after the Saints' second corner kick, and snuck it past the Boyce defense for 2-1 lead in the 80th minute.

Lucas Carmo added an insurance goal for the Saints in the 88th minute after a ball deflected out of the box and he poked it over the head of the keeper to put CCCB in front, 3-1, with just over three minutes left.

Boyce added one final tally with 53 seconds left to trim the lead to 3-2, but the Bulldogs would not record another shot as the Saints held on for the win.

Central Christian's win is fitting, as it comes 17 years to the day of their last appearance in the NCCAA DII Men's Soccer National Championship. The Saints lost all three matches in 2008 and finished eighth.

Central Christian now quickly turns their attention to the second day of Pool Play when they take on top-seeded Toccoa Falls College on Tuesday at 2:30 p.m. The game can be streamed via purchase at nccaanetwork.com/. Live stats are available for free at https://thenccaa.org/sidearmstats/msoc/summary.

In the other games on Monday, three matches were decided by one goal and a goal in the final seconds preserved the lone tie of the day, as Toccoa Falls and No. 3 seed Pensacola Christian College also picked up wins, while second-seeded Alice Lloyd College and No. 7 seed Faith Baptist Bible College played to a 2-2 draw.

Following the first day of competition, Pool A's standings are as follows:

KEY
Win= 3 points
Tie= 1 point
Loss= 0 points
WLT= Wins-Losses-Ties
PTS= Points
GS= Goals Scored
GA= Goals Against
GD= Goal Differential