[media-credit name=’DEREK MONTGOMERY/Herald photo’ align=’alignnone’ width=’648′][/media-credit]After dropping its fifth-straight match and falling in a derby contest to UW-Milwaukee Tuesday, the Wisconsin men's soccer team (4-7-0, 0-1-0 Big Ten) is desperate for a victory as the Badgers head to Pennsylvania to take on a ferocious Penn State squad (3-6-2, 0-0-0) at the Bigler Athletic Complex Sunday.

Although Penn State leads the series with a 10-7-1 record against Wisconsin, the Badgers have won the last three regular-season meetings with the Nittany Lions including a 1-0 victory at Bigler in 2003 and a thrilling 4-3 win last year in Madison on the strength of a hat-trick by former striker Nick Van Sicklen.

"We've had Penn State's number over the past couple of years," assistant coach Nick Pasquarello said. "We've beat them the last three years in the regular season and I think that is going to give us a little bit of confidence as well — a little bit of a mental edge."

For Sunday's matchup, however, the Badgers are without Van Sicklen, as last year's leading scorer graduated and joined the ranks of MLS club D.C. United. Van Sicklen's departure after last season has plagued the 2005 squad with one chronic problem: a lack of goal scoring.

So far this season, Wisconsin has produced a one-goal-per-game average, tallying just 11 strikes in their first 11 matches. In the past five matches, the Badgers have managed to score just two goals. Despite this goalscoring slump, the team is quite happy with the quality of play and the number of chances it has created.

"Even though we haven't been able to find the net as consistently as we'd like, I think we're pretty happy with some of the production that we have had in terms of keeping the ball and possessing it," Pasquarello said. "Now we just have to be a little more dangerous with that last pass or that last shot."

While the Badgers have struggled offensively as of late, the Nittany Lions have been flourishing in the attacking third — primarily to the credit of forward Jason Yeisley.

Yeisley, a 6-foot-1, 185-pound freshman from Allentown, Pa., has played sensational so far this season for Penn State, leading the team with five goals and 12 points. After his two-goal performance in their 2-1 overtime upset over defending national champion No. 5 Indiana last Friday, Yeisley was honored as Big Ten Men's Soccer Offensive Player of the Week. Yeisley also scored Penn State's lone goal this past Monday against No. 4 Akron in a tight 2-1 loss.

"He is a very dangerous player and he's very opportunistic," Pasquarello said of Yeisley. "I think we should be able to keep him in check because I'm very confident in the defenders that we have and the midfielders we have in terms of 1-v-1 ability. I think [Yeisley], along with Simon Omekanda — the other athletic forward that they have — that's a pretty good tandem right there, a pretty good 1-2 scoring pair."

In order to shut down the multifaceted attack of Penn State, Wisconsin will have to communicate more in the back and avoid all mistakes, as any miscue could provide the Lions' strikers with enough space to inflict some serious damage.

"It is going to be very difficult," Pasquarello said. "We can't take shortcuts, and we can't have mental lapses. Just like we go into every other game, I think if we keep our defensive shape, keep our communication up, and we don't have any lapses in transition, we can get the victory."

As any team caught in a slump would attest to, a win would be extremely beneficial to the team's morale.

"[It would be] huge," captain Aaron Hohlbein said of the significance of a Sunday victory. "You know, we're on a five-game losing streak right now so we need to win, and a win against a team like Penn State, a Big Ten game, that would just give us lots of confidence and it would be a huge win."