[media-credit name=’Ryan Knickmeyer’ align=’alignnone’ width=’648′][/media-credit]GREEN BAY — The Wisconsin men’s soccer team avenged losses in each of the past two seasons by defeating host UW-Green Bay 4-1 Wednesday. With revenge on their minds, the Badgers erased an early 1-0 deficit by scoring two goals in each half.

“On our little white board before the game we had a big capitalized “PAYBACK”, and I think we came out and did exactly that,” senior striker Nick Van Sicklen said after netting two goals and picking up an assist in the win.

After losing each of the past two meetings with UW-GB by 1-0 score lines, seeing the Phoenix jump out to a 1-0 lead just 6:14 into the game was cause for concern. On this occasion, however, the Badgers were able to equalize just 10 minutes later as Van Sicklen powered a shot past Phoenix goalkeeper Pat Czuprynski for his first goal of the night. The play was created by freshman B.J. Goodman, who controlled a high bouncing ball in the middle of the box before touching off to his left to Van Sicklen, who charged in to finish the play. The goal came at 17:06.

“It was important to get on the board after they got that quick one on us,” Van Sicklen said. “It’s tough when you try and get one back late in the half or late in the game against them, as we’ve seen.”

Wisconsin was able to give itself a lead that it would not relinquish when Goodman earned the first goal of his collegiate career. Goodman ran down a long ball on the weak side and slotted a shot past the keeper at 22:01. This time, it was Van Sicklen who started the play from the left side with a long cross, finding Goodman in one-on-one coverage.

“They really overplayed to one side,” head coach Jeff Rohrman said. “We just did a great job of finding that weak-side guy.”

With much of the second half being evenly played by both teams, the Badgers were able to take advantage of the Phoenix’s need to attack late in the half and Wisconsin was able to seal the victory with two late goals, one by Reid Johnson and the other by Van Sicklen.

“They were a little more in attack mode there at the end and that opened some things up for us,” Rohrman said.

Johnson’s goal came in the 79th minute, when he was able to fend off three defenders before putting the ball in the back of the net. Matthew Jelacic started the play off by turning Johnson loose with a long ball from near midfield.

“One of our goals going in was to finish our chances,” Rohrman said after seeing his squad match a season high in goals. “I thought we did that well this evening.”

Five minutes later, Van Sicklen scored his second of the night and ninth of the season to all but assure Wisconsin would go home with a win. Van Sicklen played a give-and-go with Johnson, who played a nifty heel-flick to back to Van Sicklen to allow Van Sicklen to slide the ball home inside the far post.

“Reid played me a great little flick and I did the easy work putting it in far post,” Van Sicklen said after his third multi-goal game of the season.

The Badgers, who came out a little flat in the first 10 minutes of the game, found themselves down early when senior midfielder Brandon Steenlage capped off a long run down the left flank by attempting to cross the ball through the 18-yard box. While the ball was out of the reach of his intended target, it found its way through the box to Glenn Herzog streaking down the right side. The freshman midfielder drilled a shot into the lower-right-hand corner of the net, just out of the reach of UW goaltender Eric Hanson.

“That first goal was a bit of a wake-up call for us,” Rohrman said.

Overall though, Wisconsin kept UW-Green Bay’s offense contained, giving up just three shots on goal all night. With an inventive striker like Joshua Okoampa patrolling the front line for the Phoenix, that was no small task.

“I thought we did a good job containing [Okoampa],” Rohrman said. “He’s a big-time player who can break through at any moment.”

The game was a bit chippy as the two teams combined for 50 total fouls, including seven yellow cards. Numerous times the game was delayed as the players and coaches would vocally disagree with the officials’ calls. Green Bay’s coach Tom Poitras was even issued a yellow card after arguing whether or not the referee should have allowed his team to play on with the advantage. Throughout the game, the players looked like they were confused about what the officials viewed as an infraction.

“It was a little confusing with what was a card or a foul and what wasn’t,” Rohrman said after the game. “I thought our players did a good job keeping their heads in the game and not overreacting.”