VILLANOVA, Pa. – With the hopes of a winning campaign still alive, Villanova methodically pushed its way past Holy Family 6-0 on a brilliant fall afternoon filled with sunshine and brisk winds.
 
The Wildcats got on the board in the seventh minute when freshman Joseph Margita sent a low cross that graduate student Michael teDuits calmly deposited past Tigers' goalkeeper Joey Phillips into the left side of the left.
 
Villanova went on to add five more goals from four different Wildcats. Junior Javon Daniels provided a spark off the bench, adding a pair of second half goals to quell any hopes of a Tigers' comeback.
 
Associate Head Coach Alex Balog served as acting head coach on this afternoon at the Higgins Soccer Complex while Mark Fetrow served a one-game suspension for a red card he was shown in the second half of Saturday's 3-1 loss to St. John's.
 
"We wanted to come out and put our foot on the gas pedal," said Balog, now in his seventh season on the Villanova staff. "We tried to get on the scoresheet early to dictate the tempo of the game. We did that at the beginning of the game and then faded unfortunately.
 
"I give a lot of credit to Holy Family. They've played a lot of games in the last few days (three since Saturday) and still came out and really were able to apply some pressure later in the first half after we had the early lead. Credit to Sebastian Cutler DeJesus for keeping the clean sheet. He made some really big plays."
 
After a penalty kick goal by Fynn Lahrsen made it 2-0, the Tigers responded. Holy Family, a Division II program, outshot Nova 9-6 over the first 45 minutes.
 
The tenor of the match changed early in the second half as Daniels scored goals just under six minutes apart to double the margin to 4-0. Junior Sam Nyenka picked up assists on both scores.
 
"I just think it was communication on the overlapping runs," said Daniels of the chemistry with Nyenka in the final third. "It's important that we not make the job easy for the center backs."
 
"Javon came in and I thought he was very hungry," said Balog. "I'm happy for Javon. He's been working hard all season. His pressing and re-pressing moments could have been a little bit better, but I'm happy that he got a couple today."
 
A mere 15 seconds after the second Daniels goal, freshman Matthew Klann made a steal and went on to notch his second goal of 2025. Sophomore Karson Vazquez completed the scoring when he finished off a feed from Jasper Zulman at 80:18.
 
Cutler DeJesus made six saves on the afternoon.
 
"The big positive is that we got a win," Balog said. "That gets us back to .500 and gives us the chance in our final game Friday to finally grind out a winning season. It's been four years."
 
Balog, a former head coach at Montana State Billings, had the task of filling in for Fetrow.
 
"It's been seven years," he noted with a smile. "I did it for such a long time before that it wasn't a totally foreign concept. A lot of credit goes to (assistant coach) Josh West too. It was a lot of teamwork in trying to fill the void without Coach Fetrow with us today."
 
Fetrow will return to lead Villanova into Friday night's finale at Marquette (YouTube at 7 p.m.).