Cavan Sullivan scored his first Major League Soccer goal on Wednesday night, achieving a long-awaited goal of his since signing his historic contract with the first team at just 14 years old.
His shift off the bench was one of his strongest yet, assisting the team's first goal of the night to start the second half, then finding one of his own in the 74th minute.
While the match didn't finish in favor of Philly, after the final whistle, Sullivan shared his perspective of the moment and what the milestone means to him.
What a match for you Cavan, and what a hard fought second half for this team. Not only did you play a major role in your team’s first goal of the night, you scored one of your own. Your very first in Major League Soccer. What was it like for you to watch that one go in?
It was great. I got the ball and I cut it on my left -- my favorite foot. Played a ball out to Ben, and I don't know if it was the first time or second time from him. It was all kind of a blur, but I got the ball back, it slipped past Auggie, and I was just there to put it in.
It was a great fight in the second half by these guys, but honestly, it's not enough. We need three points, or at least a point on the road, and we've got to stop giving up late. We're gonna tighten the screws and turn this thing around, because you fans deserve more, and I promise we'll be back on top soon.
This is something you've been working hard toward for a while now. What does this goal mean to you?
It means it means a lot, right? I've been waiting for this one for a while. Like I just said in another interview, it's been a year and a half without one in MLS. So, it's my first since I've been getting minutes, so it was hard earned, I put a lot of work into this. I've worked on that cutback ball, you know, hundreds of times. So yeah, I'm just looking forward to the rest of the season and bagging in more.
Two more matches before the World Cup break, one home and one away. In what ways do you want to see this team capitalize on tonight’s momentum and continue to grow in this final stretch?
We need to start out games like we like we finished the second half, just, just fighting, fighting and fighting and scoring goals. It's the best part of the game. We need to get our strikers scoring. Us 10s need to score and get our full backs and sixes getting the assists. Obviously, it's a team sport, so I'm not going to take this selfishly, but, yeah this obviously happy day for myself, and we've just got to keep going.
