He doesn’t have an exact knowledge of the number of appearances he’s made in his Greenfield School varsity boys soccer career, but junior Nathan Lozevski has likely walked every blade of grass inside the lines on Forbes Field.

There’s very little in three-plus years of high school soccer he hasn’t seen. And Monday night against Fayetteville Berean Baptist Academy, there was no need to panic with a slim 1-0 lead at the half.

Lozevski — the owner of “50 to 60” caps in his Greenfield career, unloaded for a second-half hat trick, and Greenfield turned its possession advantage into a second-half runaway en route to a 4-0 victory.

Greenfield, a 1-A member of the split 1-A/2-A Coastal Plain Independents Conference, climbed to 6-3-1. Berean Baptist, formerly members of the North Carolina Christian School Association playing their first year in the North Carolina Independent Schools Athletic Association as a 2-A provisional member, dropped to 6-4.

The Knights won 12 corner kicks, 10 of them coming in the first half. Nothing came of the corners as the Knights opted to make frequent use of the short corner to offset a lack of height in the box.

“We definitely were keeping really good possession,” Greenfield head coach Justin Wilkinson said. “What we’ve been telling them most of the time is we need to just play the way we’re facing, and just find the simple ball. Once we find the simple ball and go forward, it makes life a lot easier. Once we got into the attacking third, we were starting to get chances and get shots. They just weren’t going in the way we wanted to.”

When Greenfield did play balls into the penalty area, the defense of Berean allowed the Knights to take excessive touches without being overly challenged. Greenfield cashed in on that just before halftime, with eighth grader Landyn Coolbaugh playing a short through ball to junior Yanik Mihaljevic. Making one final pass against loose defense inside the area, Mihaljevic slid it to freshman Simon Quinn, who put it away for the 1-0 Greenfield lead in the 39th minute.

Greenfield outshot Berean 22-5 and put 12 efforts on frame.

Lozevski quickly erased any chance the Bulldogs had to make it a game in the second half, striking from 25 yards out in the 47th minute to put the Knights up by two. 

Senior R.J. Shealy rifled a kick off the post in the 49th minute, and with 16:47 to go, Lozevski dribbled into the box and fired a low shot past the goal line.

“We really picked up the pace as the game went on,” Lozevski said. “That’s what we’ve really been working on over the past couple of games that we’ve had, is just keeping the intensity throughout the game, starting early and then finishing. Thankfully, Simon was able to put his foot on it, and you got a 1-0 lead early on. My teammates just set me up for the three other goals later in the game, which eventually gave us the win.”

Mihaljevic had two assists for Greenfield, with Coolbaugh and eighth grader Cooke Rhodes adding the others. In goal, junior Nick Wester collected four saves, including a diving first-half snag that likely saved a goal. The Knights weren’t scored on in the run of play, instead conceding a goal off a set piece with 10:26 to go off Min Ra’s tap-in of a bounding ball at the goal mouth.

Prior to that, Lozevski completed the hat trick with his finish at the top of the box with 12:12 to go. 

Wilkinson cited the strong defensive play of junior Bryson Wall.

“He’s been knocking on the door for a while now,” Wilkinson said of Lozevski. “Him finally getting the opportunity to get some shots off and put them in the back of the net has been fantastic, and him, with his leadership especially this year from being on the team probably the longest of everybody on here, it’s been good to see him finally capitalize.”

Greenfield remains home Tuesday to face New Life Camp.

Of Greenfield’s three losses, none have come to NCISAA 1-A foes as the Knights, defending NCISAA 1-A champions, have lost to 3-A Cape Fear Academy, 2-A Fayetteville Academy, and reigning North Carolina Christian School Association 2-A champion Wilson Christian.

“This team may not have been our highest competitor yet,” Lozevski said of Berean. “But we still played a good performance, and we’re willing to bring that up into those higher-level games.