Box Score

EASTON, PA—Lafayette scored twice in the first half and then traded second-half goals with visiting NJIT for a 3-1 win over the Highlanders in non-conference men's soccer Tuesday night.
 
The Leopards (7-5-3) snapped a three-match losing streak that had included 1-0 overtime losses in its previous two starts with Tuesday's win over the Highlanders (4-9-2). NJIT, which played for the first time since October 15, has lost its last two following a three-game winning streak between October 2 and 11. The Leopards ran their home record to 5-1-2 (NJIT is 1-8 on the road, offsetting its own solid 3-1-2 home mark).
 
Lafayette got goals from three different players, with the first scored by Blake Fink, his fourth of the year, in the 11th minute, giving the home team the upper hand for the rest of the night. Fink was assisted by Kyle Scharfenberg.
 
The score stayed at 1-0 for the Leopards when Eli Hajjar connected on his first goal of the year for Lafayette just 33 seconds from the halftime whistle. He was assisted by Chandler Fraser-Pauls and Tom McCutcheon.
 
Down 2-0, NJIT got back in contention with the first goal of the year for Nils Warfving, assisted by Christian Nieto, at 62:39.
 
With more than 27 minutes left to equalize, the Highlanders could not mount enough of an attack and their task grew more difficult, ultimately hopeless, when Scharfenberg gave his team extra breathing room on a header off of a Sean Peckham corner kick at 80:30. The goal was the fourth of the season for Scharfenberg, a junior.
 
Lafayette finished Tuesday's match with a 14-5 lead in overall shots, including 7-3 in shots on goal. Leopard goalkeeper Nathan McDonald stopped two NJIT shots, while the Highlander keeper, Lars Maalen-Johansen had one save, while the Highlanders were also credited with a team save.
 
The opening goal came on a pass out of midfield by Scharfenberg, who found Fink behind the NJIT defense for the score at 10:27.
 
The second Leopard goal, just before halftime, came when Fraser-Pauls served the ball into the box to McCutcheon, who sent it on to the senior Hajjar, who finished, making it 2-0.
 
Both second half goals, one for each team, were headers off of corner kicks.
 
Warfving, who had three goals in his debut season last year, picked up his first tally of 2011 when he headed home Nieto's corner.
 
The Lafayette insurance goal less than 10 minutes from the end, was a header by Scharfenberg off of Peckham's corner.
 
Peckham had missed out on what would have been a goal of his own when he hit the post about five minutes prior to Scharfenberg's goal.
 
The goal and the post were part of a 6-0 shots advantage for the Leopards after Warfving had trimmed the deficit for NJIT in the 63rd minute.
 
NJIT will play its remaining two regular season games in the Atlantic Soccer Conference, beginning with the last home game of the year, a visit from two-time defending conference champion and 2011 conference leader Adelphi in a 7 pm game Saturday night on Lubetkin Field at Mal Simon Stadium.
 
The Highlanders will mark the last home game for seven of their veteran players with pre-game Senior Night ceremonies on Saturday.