Timbers Academy alumni Foster Langsdorf and Sam Werner and their Stanford University Cardinal teammates just keep rolling in the 2016 NCAA men’s soccer tournament.
On Saturday evening, the Cardinal defeated Louisville 2-0 on the road behind a goal each from Langsdorf and Werner.
After a second consecutive tightly-contested affair, Stanford broke the scoreless deadlock in the 64th minute when Langsdorf rose up enough to head a Stanford corner kick past Louisville's goalkeeper Stefan Cleveland.
The goal was Langsdorf's 15th in all competitions this season for the Cardinal and the third match in a row in which he's scored the game-winning goal (he's scored a total of eight game-winning goals over the course of the 2016 season). The 15 goals mark is also the most by a Stanford men's soccer player since Willie Guicci scored 22 in 1981.
Werner, a redshirt sophomore, added insurance for the Cardinal with his 79th minute goal, a curving free kick taken 28 yards from goal that beat Cleveland to the upper left corner. The goal was Werner's second of 2016.
For Werner, the goal must have felt particularly sweet. The Timbers Academy graduate has spent most of the past two seasons coming off of the bench for the Cardinal, filling whatever role on the pitch that head coach Jeremy Gunn has asked of him.
He explained what this process was like for him after Stanford's 1-0 victory over Virginia last week.
“I see guys ahead of me graduate out and I know the roles I'm going to be filling as I'm stepping up and getting older so there's a lot of clarity in terms of our roles,” he said, adding, “and it's super fun to get a bigger role as I get older and hopefully continue to do so.”
Forward Mo Thiaw, a Timbers U-23s alum, played 87 minutes on the losing side for Louisville.
With the win, Stanford will now advance to the semifinals of the College Cup, where they will face the University of North Carolina for the chance at becoming the first back-to-back national champions since Indiana University performed that feat in 2003 and 2004.
The run to the Final Four is a remarkable turnaround for the Cardinal, just one year after losing five starters from last year's squad – including forward Jordan Morris, now with Seattle Sounders FC – who accounted for just over half of the team's goals in 2015.
More importantly for the Cardinal, though, the shutout against Louisville means that the team's defense has now held its playoff opponents scoreless for the last 512 minutes of play, dating all the way back to last season's run to the national championship. Should that shutout streak continue, Stanford will have every opportunity to play for its second championship in two years.
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Langsdorf and Werner are the last remaining Timbers Academy alumni still in the tournament, but two Timbers U-23s alums are also still active. Tucker and Walker Hume of the University of North Carolina—who helped the Tar Heels to a 1-0 double overtime win over Providence Friday—will square off against Langsdorf, Werner, and the Stanford Cardinal at BBVA Compass Stadium in Houston, Texas on December 9 in the College Cup semifinal.
