BELLEVUE, Neb. -- Bellevue University men's soccer junior Ben Martin and sophomore Rob Smith have been named North Star Athletic Association Defensive and Offensive Players of the Week, respectively, as announced by the NSAA.
The award is the first such accolade of Martin's career while Smith earned one such conference award as a freshman in 2014. The duo helped the No. 14 Bruins to a 1-1-0 week with a 1-0 overtime win against (RV) Hope International and a 2-1 overtime defeat at Westminster.
Smith scored the game-winning goal 39 seconds into extra time and Martin posted his third clean sheet of the campaign to send BU to a 1-0 victory on Friday.
Smith, last year's MCAC Freshman of the Year, now has 12 career goals as he's played primarily as an advanced midfielder for the Bruins. Of those 12 goals, seven have been of the game-winning variety, which has him tied for third with Jon Page ('07) and Adam Hooi ('08) all-time in BU history. He trails current Bruin assistant coach Mark Heath-Preston ('10) and Graeme Eaglesham ('12) who netted 15 and eight game-winners, respectively.
Martin has now stopped 16 of the 18 live shots he's seen – he's also conceded a pair of goals from the penalty spot – and has a 0.75 goals against average, .800 save percentage, and three shutouts on the year.
The Bruins are back on the pitch on Thursday, Sept. 10 with a 7 p.m. match in Seward, Neb. against Concordia University.
