BUCHANAN — The Niles Vikings soccer team was not going to allow the rain soaked field, the on again off again rain storms or the Buchanan Bucks prevent them from getting coach Jerry Holtgren his 99th career victory as head coach as the Vikings took the 4-1 victory at Buchanan on Tuesday afternoon.

“No. 99 feels good, but I think it will mean more when we get No. 100,” said coach Holtgren. “It’s just a testament to the good guys I’ve had and that they are willing to listen and be coached.”

The Vikings and the Bucks battled back and forth for just over 38 minutes before either team would find the back of the net. When the weather is as it was on Tuesday you never know what kind of break can go your way.

The first break of the day came when Christian Rackley passed the ball into the box trying to make something happen when one of the Bucks defenders miskicked his attempt at clearing the ball away and instead knocked it past goalie Cade Vargo for the own goal with just 1:53 remaining in the half giving the Vikings the 1-0 halftime lead.

In the second half the Vikings took control offensively and possessed the ball in their offensive end of the field most of the half, but still could not manage to find the goal. Finally with just under 15 minutes remaining in the contest, Cole Krassow took a pass from Alex Wright and found the net giving the Vikings the 2-0 lead.

Mere seconds after Krassow’s goal, Chase Hullinger would get loose in the Buchanan zone and beat Vargo giving the Vikings a commanding 3-0 lead.

The Bucks, who had zero shot attempts in the second half of the game, managed to find the scoreboard when Niles failed to clear a corner kick and inadvertently returned the favor of an own goal bringing the score to 3-1 with 11:41 to play.

Cicone Palmore finished the scoring for the Vikings as he got his own rebound and found the net bringing the final score to 4-1.

“We do a nice job of playing the ball out wide, but haven’t been able to funnel it into the middle,” continued Holtgren. “We were trying to play some combination play right in the middle and split the seams that the defense offers us. We’ve got some speed up front, and we were able to split those seams in the second half.”

For the Bucks, the offense couldn’t get on track.

“We played a really good game for a while, and even after we scored on ourselves we didn’t let it bother us and we got right back into it,” said Buchanan coach Brian Pruett. “Eventually they were able to break us down in a few positions and they took advantage of it.”

The Vikings will go for coach Holtgren’s 100th victory Tuesday afternoon as they start play in their conference tournament. The Bucks will play again Thursday against Bridgman in their final Lakeland Conference regular season match. The league tournament begins Wednesday, Oct. 5.