KENOSHA, Wis. - The Carthage College Red Men concluded their 2017 regular season with Senior Night against Augustana College on Saturday evening, defeating the Vikings 3-0 at Art Keller Field.

Prior to the match, head coach Steve Domin and the Red Men honored seniors Daniel Axtman, Joseph Klawitter, Sahr Mahoney, Johnny Rimkus and Jamie Tausend.

The win improves the Red Men to 12-6-1 on the season and will be the number-three seed in the upcoming College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin Men's Soccer Tournament, while Augustana's season ends at 2-12-2 and 1-7-0 in the conference.  The victory also extends the Red Men's season long win streak to five matches.

"Really proud to be part of the Carthage family today!" said head coach Steve Domin after the win to cap the day.  "Our football team rolled, our women's volleyball team knock off #1 Wittenburg, our women's soccer team won in dramatic fashion, both men's and women's swimming programs beat Lake Forest, and we were lucky enough to put an exclamation mark on the end of the day… We got a great chance to play a bunch of different guys, reward some worthy, worthy seniors, and solidified ourselves among the top of, what I believe, is one of the strongest soccer leagues.  We actually resulted against the top two team and came up a sliver short against the fourth.  People often forget we beat each other up so much in league-play we aren't at full strength on the days in between."

Carthage and Augie exchanged blows in the first 45 minutes forcing both goalkeepers to makes saves in the half, with Carthage's Niko Mavrogiannis recording a pair early.  Carthage had a the edge in the half with a 5-2 advantage in shot, 4-2 on target, but were unable to find the net.

That changed in the second half, as the Red Men were constantly on the attack and had 18 shots in the second period.  Carthage finally made the Vikings pay six minutes into the second half as Nicholas Messineo put away a header off a Tausend corner kick to give the Red Men the 1-0 lead in the 51st minute.  The goal was the first of Messineo's career.

Carthage extended the lead in the 73rd minute after Kevin Reilly was dragged down in the box and the Red men were awarded a penalty kick, which Jamie Tausend buried for the 2-0 lead.

Four minutes later Luke Schoffstall beat his defender along the Augustana endline and crossed a ball that Jorge Triana put past a helpless Jeremy Klaber for the third goal, coming in the 76th minute.

"I was proud Nick M. found the back of the net.  He could have iced North Park and Millikin earlier this year, and we probably would be hanging a banner.  Its so hard to win championships, you need a lot of things to go your way, and we hope to be peaking at the right time moving into next week…Kevin Reilly, Luke Schoffstall and Adrain Herrera all earned hustle points today that just don't show up in the book."

The Red Men will head to Bloomington, Illinois for their first round CCIW Tournament matchup as Carthage will face Illinois Wesleyan University on Tuesday, October 30th at 7:00 p.m.  On the other side of the bracket, top-seed North Park University will play North Central College.  The winners will face off at the highest remaining seed on Saturday.