Antigonish, NS – The STFX X-Men closed out AUS regular season play with an exciting 1-0 victory over the UNB Reds Friday night at STFX Stadium.

Logan Rieck's ( Cambridge, ON) goal in the 43^rd minute – the only one of the game – was all the home team needed to hang onto the win.

Prior to the game, STFX acknowledged senior graduating student-athletes Josh MacKillop (Sydney, NS), Ziad Abdelrahman (Toronto, ON), Lewis Dye (Fall River, NS), Logan Harrington (Halifax, NS), Carson Ripoll (New Glasgow, NS) and Jack Kennedy (Antigonish, NS).

In an entertaining and fast-paced match with a potential second place semifinal playoff bye on the line, both teams played hard the full 90 minutes.

Both goaltenders came up with huge saves time and again in the match with each keeper earing player of the game status for their respective teams.

UNB keeper Louis-Charles Vaillancourt (Sherbrooke, QC) and his counterpart in the X net Samuel Diltz (Newmarket, ON) each had eight saves on the night.

Rieck's goal came off a floater pass from Samuel Barrowcliffe (Princeton, ON) as he soft touched the ball into the Reds net late in the first half to give the X-Men the one-goal lead at halftime.

Both squads had their opportunities in the second half. Kyle Cordeiro (Oakville, ON) hit two cross bars for the X-Men and the Reds could have tied the game on a penalty kick in the 51^st minute.

Diltz was given a yellow card after he challenged the ball outside his box and Reds striker Luke Rosettani (Kanata, ON) stepped up to the penalty spot but his low shot was saved by a diving Diltz.

The X-Men played with a man down for the final 15 minutes of the game after Max Bodurtha (Halifax, NS) was assessed his second yellow card of the night.

The Reds did all they could to score the equalizer as they frantically pressured in the final minutes of the game and into extra time. Diltz made a couple key saves and time ran out as the X-Men held on for the slim victory and a key three points in the AUS standings.

Both the X-Men and Reds finish the season with identical 7-3-2 records and 23 points. With the victory tonight the X-Men secured second place in the tiebreaker scenario against the Reds, earning a first round playoff bye.

Complete standings will be finalized following matches tomorrow, but STFX and UNB have punched their tickets to the Subway AUS Championship taking place November 2-5 in Sydney. Cape Breton University will play host to STFX, UNB,  Saint Mary's, Moncton and Dalhousie as the top six teams in the conference will battle for the AUS banner.

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Recap courtesy Krista McKenna, STFX Athletics

Sam Diltz earned Player of the Game honours with an 8 save shutout in the X-Men's 1-0 victory over UNB! #goxgo #SubwayFuel pic.twitter.com/682LZsyumR

— StFX Athletics (@StFXAthletics) October 29, 2022