SENATOBIA - A balanced attack led the Northwest Community College men's soccer team to an important MACCC win on Tuesday afternoon against East Mississippi Community College, spreading the wealth to five different goal scorers in a 5-2 win at home under the lights. 

"Tonight we fought hard and we found the back of the net," Head Men's Soccer Coach Michael Sullivan said. "There's times we were looking a bit dodgy but some of our guys came in and changed the momentum of the game. Everybody did their job in a team effort and I'm extremely excited about it."

Northwest opened the game with plenty of pressure on the Lions goalie and on just their second shot of the game in the eighth minute, Tendai Machingura powered a shot past on a cross from Tyler Starnes to put the Rangers up 1-0 and put momentum squarely on their side. 

The pace continued to be controlled by NWCC, but despite that, a free kick set up East Mississippi for a header after it was sent over the top of the Ranger defense and was finished on a dive to just slip the ball past Jacob Little and even the match at 1-1 in the 20th minute. 

It didn't take long for Northwest to answer back as their pressure led to a second goal, this time from Chase Michael who moved up on the attack from the back line to finish an assist from Machingura from 25 yards out in the 23rd minute to return the lead to the host team and put NWCC up 2-1. They would never trail again, giving themselves a cushion six minutes later when Michael Sanders took a free kick into the box and gave Michael the assist in the 29th minute. 

That closed the scoring through the halftime break until the Lions struck first in the second half in the 58th minute. A corner kick was finished to close the gap to 3-2 but Northwest once again answered back quickly. 

In the 63rd minute, Ariel Vallejo buried his first of the match on what would end up as his only shot of the game to reestablish the lead at two from 15 yards out. The Rangers added one more insurance goal in the 83rd when Starnes traded roles from the opening goal of the game with Machingura, finishing a cross from the freshman from Zimbabwe to increase the lead to 5-2 and put the game on ice. 

All five goals were scored by different Rangers and four were assisted on in the game and Sullivan said this is a team that has multiple players that can play in multiple spots. 

"We have quite a few dynamic players. I was extremely pleased with the different roles everyone was playing and their willingness to play different roles."

Northwest saw another strong effort in goal during the match from Jacob Little who made four saves in the game including one late in the second half that forced him to use all of his 6'4" frame to keep out of the net while the defense in front of him only allowed six total shots on goal from the Lions in the game. 

The Rangers on the other hand took 24 shots, growing in confidence and accuracy as the match went on with 14 of those shots in the second half and six of those shots being placed on goal. NWCC also finished with five corner kicks. 

It was a physical game as was evident by the fouls. The two sides combined for 28 in the match with two resulting in yellow cars for the Rangers. Kamden Viverette picked up a card in the 83rd minute and Ariel Vallejo had one in the 90th minute. 

The win improves the Rangers to 3-2-2 on the season and gets them off to a 1-0 start in MACCC play. They will continue their conference schedule on Friday night when they travel to Raymond for a battle with Hinds Community College. Hinds enters the match at #10 in the most recent NJCAA DII coaches poll but are coming off of a 2-0 loss to #12 Jones College on Tuesday night. 

Information on Friday night's game can be found at nwccrangers.com or on Ranger social media accounts.