KANSAS CITY, Kan. – With a chance to avenge their only loss of the season and win the season series amongst the top two teams in the Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference, the Cowley College men’s soccer team used an early goal followed by two second-half goals three minutes apart to earn a 3-0 win over Barton Community College and claim the 2025 NJCAA Division 1 Men’s Soccer Plains District Tournament Title on Saturday, November 8th.

With the win, Cowley advances to their fifth-straight NJCAA D1 Men’s Soccer National Tournament and will have a chance to see if they can overcome last year’s heartbreaking defeat in penalty kicks in the 2024 NJCAA D1 Men’s Soccer National Championship match. The Tigers are now 14-1-1 overall this season while the Cougars will await a potential at-large bid to the National Tournament to extend their season while falling to 16-4-2 overall as three of their four losses have come to teams currently ranked in the top five of the NJCAA D1 Men’s Soccer rankings.

After seeing regular season battles between Cowley and Barton end in a 2-1 Tiger win and a 1-0 Cougar victory, the expectation was for another battle between teams ranked in the top five of NJCAA D1 Men’s Soccer rankings and a battle worthy of taking place in the postseason with a championship on the line. Following an opening 10 minutes that Saw Barton come out fast-paced and trying to control the tempo by earning two corner kicks and keeping the ball on Cowley’s end of the field, the Tigers gained control in the 14th minute as a drive by Shuto Sasaki led to a pass into the middle of the 18-yard box for a running Leonardo Leitao who stayed onside while getting an outstretched left foot onto the ball just in front of the penalty kick spot to get the game’s opening score. The goal seemed to awake the Cowley offense as the Tigers put up three more shots over the next eight minutes of play and began to take control of the tempo just to see Barton come up with another spurt with three shots of their own forcing two saves by goalkeeper Lukas Lowry on the other end. Closing out the first half, Cowley continued to keep the pressure on Barton by playing more directly and forcing the Cougars to make quick decisions defensively as the half would end without any additional scoring to keep things at a 1-0 contest.

The back-and-forth that was seen from end-to-end in the first half carried over into the second half with both teams earning corner kicks and placing shots on target in the opening five minutes out of halftime as the game was still very much for the taking with the Tigers trying to protect a one-goal lead. As Cowley continued to find openings and place shots on goal to force saves by Barton goalie Gabriel Bergamin, the Tigers broke through again on their ninth shot of the second half when a corner kick was awarded in the 72nd minute and led to a ball being sent by Omar Ocampos to the back post where Alberto de Miguel played things back across the net for Guilherme Coutinho to drive home the game’s second goal.

Needing just two additional minutes of game time to find the back of the net one final time, an intercepted pass near midfield was played deep for the Tiger by Hayato Yoshitake for Renan Syrio. Taking the ball near the end line and dribbling passed Bergamin who came off his line to try and make a stop, Syrio saw a wide-open net and took no chances by putting his shot into the back of the net from six yards out to all but put the game away with Cowley now up 3-0. Both teams were able to record two additional shots in the final 10 minutes of action but did not change the score or outcome of the match as the Tigers were able to drain off the rest of the time to secure a fifth-straight district title.

Cowley outshot Barton 22-8 in the contest, including a 14-4 advantage in shots on goal as Lowry picked up the win in net after earning his eighth shutout of the season. Offensively, the Tigers were led by five shots from Leitao and four shots from Ishii, with three of Leitao’s shots being on goal while Keitatsu Yoshida had both of his shots on goal.

The 2025 NJCAA Division 1 Men’s Soccer National Tournament is scheduled to take place November 16-22 at Daytona State College in Daytona Beach, Florida with the official tournament seeding set to be revealed at 5 PM (CST) on Tuesday, November 11th. Eight district tournament winners who received automatic bids into the tournament along with four teams who will receive at large berths will be seeded and broken into four pools with each team playing two games in pool play over the first three days of action. The winner of the four pools will then advance to the National Semifinals with the National Championship match scheduled for Saturday, November 22nd.