ORLANDO, Fla. -- The Fortress is officially Duncan McGuire's den.
The rookie continued his torrid start to the season on Saturday, connecting for his second goal in as many matches -- and his first in front of the home faithful at Exploria Stadium -- in the 23rd minute of Orlando City's 3-1 defeat against D.C. United.
The Lions' sixth overall pick in the 2023 SuperDraft, McGuire took a nice through ball from Martín Ojeda and skirted past a defender before blasting a right-footed strike past D.C. United goalkeeper Tyler Miller for his team-leading third goal of the young campaign.
McGuire, winner of the 2022 MAC Hermann Trophy -- an annual award given to college soccer’s best player -- when he set the Creighton University single-season record for goals in a season with 23, then ran to "The Wall" supporters section, pumping his arms wildly in the air to charge up the frenzied crowd.
"We executed a perfect press the way that we'd like to do the majority of the time, and the way that we like to press," Ojeda said of the play to set up McGuire's goal.
"Antonio [Carlos] was able to recover really quickly, and I saw Duncan using his face well, and so, I just tried to hit him on the counterattack to put it in 1-on-1 with the keeper. With luck, it happened, and he was able to score the goal."
With the marker, McGuire became the first SuperDraft selection to net three goals in his first six games of a debut season since Daryl Dike in 2020 -- also with Orlando City.
The goal set off quite the reaction on social media, too, with MLSSoccer.com's Matthew Doyle tweeting, "Duncan McGuire's going to end up being the best #9 Orlando City's ever drafted, and that's saying quite a bit."
High praise for one cool rookie.
Photos
Here's how it looked on the pitch through the lens of team photographers Mark Thor and Jeremy Reper:
