HARRISONBURG, Va. (JMU Athletics) – James Madison redshirt senior Yanis Lelin netted his first career brace and sophomore Jeffrey Aguilar recorded five points to lead the 10th-ranked Dukes to their fifth straight win, as they defeated Radford, 5-0, in non-conference men’s soccer at Sentara Park on Tuesday night.

The Dukes improved to 5-0-3 and have their first five-match winning streak since winning six straight in 2021. The Highlanders dropped to 0-8.

Outshooting Radford 26-2, the Dukes had four players record at least three shots, led by redshirt senior Evan Southern’s five. Southern had four of the 16 shots on goal by JMU. It is the most shots since taking 32 against Northeastern on Oct. 5, 2019, and the most shots on goal since having 18 against Saint Joseph’s on Sept. 11, 2009.

Quoting Head Coach Paul Zazenski
“Tonight was a complete team effort. We had a great start to the match and really played on the front foot. It was great to see a few different guys contribute tonight both on the stat sheet and in the run of play. We secured a shutout and didn’t give up many chances. Now it’s time to start preparing for another difficult Sun Belt away match this Saturday.”

How It Happened
• The Dukes began aggressively, taking nine shots in the opening 12:07 of the match with four on goal.
• JMU opened the scoring in the 13th minute on the 10th shot of the night, as Lelin netted the first goal off passes from Southern and Aguilar with all occurring inside the 18.
• Reigning Sun Belt Defensive Player of the Week Davide Materazzi got on the stat sheet, scoring on a header in the 35th minute off of a corner kick sent in by Milo Wray.
• The Dukes took a 2-0 lead into halftime, outshooting the visitors 15-1 with nine shots on goal.
• Lelin netted his second goal of the night in the 47th minute, taking a straight pass from sophomore Luca Nikolai before making one dribble in the box and firing off the shot. The sequence was set up by Aguilar for his second assist of the match.
• Redshirt senior Josiah Blanton made it 4-0 in the 62nd minute. Freshman Agustín Donoso sent a pass from near midfield to Aguilar in the box who had space and crossed it over to Blanton.
• In the 71st minute, Aguilar capped the scoring off to make it 5-0 after taking a pass near midfield and driving to just outside the box before finding the back of the lower left net.

Quick Facts
• The Dukes had a 13-2 advantage on corner kicks It was the most corner kicks the Dukes have recorded since taking 13 against Hofstra in the CAA title match on April 17, 2021.
• Jeffrey Aguilar became the first Duke to record three assists in a match since Rodrigo Robles had three against Georgia State in the Sun Belt semifinals on Nov. 9, 2022.
• From the one goal and three assists, Aguilar racked up five points in the contest to be the first Duke with five points since Evan Southern netted a hat trick against Georgia State last season.
• The last time JMU scored five goals was against Georgia Southern last season, which is also the last time JMU had at least four goal scorers in a single match.
• JMU is unbeaten in the first eight matches of the season, the eighth time in program history of the occurrence.

Up Next
The Dukes will hit the road for the next three matches, beginning on Saturday, Sept. 28 when they travel to Georgia Southern for a 7 p.m. kickoff.

— JMU Athletics —