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CHICAGO (October 22, 2018) – The red-hot Ramblers are back on the pitch Tuesday night (Oct. 23) for their final home match of the regular season. Currently in the driver's seat to win the Missouri Valley Conference regular season championship, Loyola welcomes in-state foe, Northern Illinois, to Rogers Park for a match dedicated to Cancer Awareness.
 
Last Time Out: Loyola won its fourth match in as many tries, and pushed its unbeaten streak to six with a 3-0 win over Evansville last time out. Junior Aidan Megally netted a pair of goals to help guide Loyola to the win, while freshman Fabian Becerra pitched in a tally as well. Megally's two-goal performance was the Ramblers' first of the season against a DI opponent. The back line turned in another outstanding performance by not allowing a single Evansville shot on goal – giving goalkeeper Josh Lagudah his second zero-save shutout of the season. The 3-0 win was Lagudah's fourth straight shutout, and his seventh of the season. The seven goose eggs produced puts him in a tie for seventh in single-season shutouts in program history.

A Look at Northern Illinois: The Northern Illinois Huskies currently sit at fourth in the Mid-American Conference (MAC) and have compiled an 8-5-1 overall record. After recently suffering a three-game skid, the Huskies have gotten the wheels back on the track with a 2-2 tie and a 2-1 win vs. Drake and Akron respectively as their most recent results entering Tuesday. NIU's primary weapon in the offensive third is forward Nick Markanich. The Bourbonnais, Ill. native has logged eight goals and is second in the MAC in shots (47). Konrad Dziedzic has started all but one match between the posts and boasts a 1.26 GAA average, .622 save percentage, but a respectable five shutouts.
 
Series Stuff: Northern Illinois historically has held the edge over Loyola at a 13-5-3 clip, but the Ramblers have enjoyed the majority of the success in recent years, going 5-1-2 in the last eight matchups dating back to 2001. The Ramblers have won the last two meetings, and a win on Tuesday would tie their longest winning streak against the Huskies when they won three straight from 2001-03. The Maroon and Gold dismissed the Huskies in the last regular season matchup back in 2016 by a score of 2-0. First half goals from Aidan Megally and Alec Lasinski pushed the program's home unbeaten streak to 25 games that at the time was the longest in Division I men's soccer. The Ramblers also got the better of the Huskies in 2015 when a Tim Dobrowolski led squad edged NIU 1-0 in a shutout that saw the goalkeeper tie the program record for career shutouts.
 
Up Next: Loyola plays its final MVC match of the regular season in a road tilt at Central Arkansas on Saturday (Oct. 27) at 7 p.m. A Rambler win would clinch the regular season MVC championship and would mark the first time in program history the Maroon and Gold finished the regular season conference slate unbeaten.

#OnwardLU