It was only a matter of time before the group formerly known as the 16th best men’s college soccer team in the nation lived up to the hype that has haunted them since week one. As shocking as it may seem, Friday’s 2-1 win over visiting West Virginia (4-5-1, 1-2-1 Big East) followed by Sunday’s 3-0 shutout of America East rival Stony Brook (2-7-1, 0-1-0 AE) marked the first time this season that the Northeastern men’s soccer team put together back-to-back wins.
“It’s a good feeling,” said junior co-captain Joe Parrish. “We’re playing with confidence and we’re finally starting to string some wins together.”
The two wins improve the Huskies’ record to 5-4-2 overall. NU’s 2-1-1 America East record puts the Huskies in a familiar spot that they haven’t been in for awhile: first place.
“I think coming into the season we were a little overconfident because of what we did last year,” said NU head coach Ed Matz. “Now that we’ve got that out of our systems we are starting to play better.”
With just over a minute to play in the scoreless first half of Sunday’s conference battle with SBU, Parrish headed in a direct kick off the foot of sophomore midfielder Tom Heimreid for his first goal of the season. Just five minutes into the second half, the Huskies would strike again on a brilliant goal by senior co-captain Atha Kirkopoulos.
Kirkopoulos displayed his great ball-handling skills by putting the ball between a defender’s legs and then lifting his shot far post to give the defending AE champs a 2-0 lead with his third goal of the season. The bleeding didn’t stop there for the Seawolves, as just two minutes later the Dogs would score again when freshman midfielder Daniel Ivec, the current America East Rookie of the Week, put in a one-timer off a feed from sophomore Jeff Gannon. The goal was Ivec’s team-leading fourth of the season and gave the Huskies a 3-0 lead.
NU keeper Sergio Saccoccio made three saves en route to his fourth shutout of the season. Although the score may not reflect it, the match was as physical as they come, with a total of six yellow cards given out to go along with the 38 fouls the two teams combined for (NU-17, SBU-21).
Friday night’s 2-1 win over West Virginia at Parsons Field may well be the turning point these Hounds have been looking for. After starting the game on the offensive and notching two first half goals, the Huskies tightened up their defense and held off the Mountaineers second half surge on the way to their third non-conference win of the season.
“I was worried going into Friday’s game because I thought the guys might look past WVU and have Sunday’s conference game on their minds,” said Matz. “Instead we played some of the best soccer we’ve played all season.”
Ivec put NU on top at the 5:57 mark when he put in a deflection from a Kirkopoulos direct kick to give Northeastern the 1-0 lead. With just three minutes remaining in the half; junior Andrew Hickey broke a few ankles in front of the net, and placed a perfect pass on junior Michael Cipriano’s foot, who then put the ball in the net for a two-goal Husky advantage heading into the break.
The Mountaineers only goal of the game would come late in the second half on a penalty shot by Junior Aaron Pitchkolan. The goal brought WVU within one goal of the Huskies, but would be their last goal of the night.
“I think Friday’s game against WVU was our first dominant win of the season,” Parrish said.
So, why the sudden turn around?
“We were doing enough to play well before, but not enough to win,” Matz said. “We challenged the players to push even harder and try to get over the hump.”
Wednesday night, the Huskies visit cross town rival Boston College for a rematch of last year’s second-round NCAA tournament game in which the Eagles ended the Huskies season with a 2-1 victory at Parsons Field. Then the Huskies visit conference foe Boston University Saturday night for a big America East match up.
“We’ve got a big week ahead of us,” Matz said. “We all want to finish the job against BC, but I think the more important game is definitely Saturday’s match against BU.”
“BC is a huge game,” Parrish said. “We have kind of a friendly rivalry with those guys because of what happened last year and because we play with a lot of them over the summer.”
Both Wednesday’s game against BC at Newton Campus Soccer Field, and Saturday’s game against BU at Nickerson Field are scheduled to start at 7 p.m.
Freshman Kristin Kowalik and the women’s soccer team won their sixth straight game on Tuesday, blanking Sacred Heart, 3-0 at Parsons Field. The Lady Huskies have allowed just two goals over that span, including four shutouts. With the surge, NU sits second in the America East Conference, just a point behind cross-town rival Boston University.
