MADISON, Wis. – The Wisconsin men's soccer team lined up in a Saturday night showdown at the McClimon Soccer Complex for the second game of the PAC the MAC special that featured the women's team winning against Minnesota, 1-0, beforehand. The Badgers' (3-1-2) men's soccer team earned their third home win of the season against the Loyola Ramblers (3-4-0), 2-0, securing the doubleheader sweep for Wisconsin.
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The Badgers extended their home unbeaten streak to 16 games, dating back to the 2015 season.
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The first half was quiet aside from a tough scoring effort from Badger seniors
Tom Barlow and
Chris Mueller. Mueller carried the ball up the field and fired a shot at the Ramblers net that got deflected out. Barlow happened to be in the right place at the right time, knocking the ball home for his third goal of the season.
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Possession bounced back and forth between the Badgers and the Ramblers the rest of the half but Wisconsin managed an 8-4 advantage in the shots category. Wisconsin also led in shots on net 4-1.
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Wisconsin locked up the 2-0 victory right out of the gates in the second half as Mueller fired in his second goal of the season on a penalty kick goal in the 53rd minute.
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Shots ended 11-7 in favor of Wisconsin. The Badgers also led in shots on goal, 5-3.
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Straight from the Pitch:
Head coach John Trask
"We're going down to play a very good Duke team in the ACC, if they're not in the top 10Â they're right there. This is the way you want to leave town, with a good positive result, a good feeling among the guys. This was our first shut out of the season, we shutout an NAIA team in the preseason, but to pitch a zero, it's something you have to be able to do in college soccer so I was proud of that, that we were not going to let a ball move behind the line tonight. Chris [Mueller] takes that crack at goal and Tommy [Barlow] is there to follow it up. That's huge, we finish up the half well and you know the second half we were smart. We didn't go crazy the first few minutes, we made sure to handle whatever they were going to send at us and then Mike [Catalano] made a great play, kept with the ball and got brought down and Chris tucked the PK away. Good performance."
On what he liked from the guys tonight:Â "Some of the possession stuff in moments when we go to goal I think is some real quality work. There's a lot of deception, there is a lot of speed to it. There's a lot of change of pace and we're efficient around goal. We had five shots on goal, two of them were in the back of the net obviously, one's a penalty kick. We're not a team that maybe gets as many shots as some teams but when we get the ball around goal we put it in at a pretty good rate, which is never a bad sign for a soccer team."
Up Next: Wisconsin ends its home stint and heads on the road to face Duke in Durham, North Carolina on Wednesday night at 6 p.m.
