The Wisconsin men’s soccer team intends to continue Michigan’s troubles on the road Saturday night. In three road games this season, Michigan has only managed to score two goals while losing all three games.
Saturday’s game against the Wolverines (4-5-1, 1-1-1 Big Ten) will be the Badgers’ (3-6-3, 0-2-0) third conference game of the season.
The Wolverines have a bitter taste in their mouths after losing 2-0 to the Badgers in the first round of the Big Ten tournament last season. Michigan was unable to avenge its regular season loss to Wisconsin, leaving the team with two losses against the Badgers last year.
Wisconsin is aiming to turn around its poor conference record and will try to start doing so against Michigan. Head coach John Trask considers the Badgers’ first two conference matchups to be difficult ones.
“We have played two of the better teams in the Big Ten up to this point; none of the Big Ten games are easy. Last year, we went 4-2 in conference. We are 0-2 this year, and we have four more opportunities,” Trask said. “We played Indiana at Indiana and a pretty good Penn State team who beat us in the first Big Ten game on our schedule. Now we have a chance to be home against Michigan and get a win.”
The Badgers had several opportunities to secure the win against UW-Milwaukee Wednesday night. The team’s combination play opened up chances in front of the net despite some transitional difficulty in the midfield.
“We have to continue getting used to each other. The more we play with each other, the more we will develop a relationship with our midfield,” sophomore defender AJ Cochran said. “We will start to understand people, what our players are good at, what they are not good at and from there our midfielders will be able to work well with our forwards to create those good opportunities.”
Michigan will not make it easy for Wisconsin to find the back of the net. Sophomore goalkeeper Adam Grinwis, named Big Ten Defensive Player of the Week, had a career high 12 saves against Penn State last weekend. Second in the Big Ten with 44 saves, Grinwis posted his second shutout of the season against Oakland University Tuesday.
There is hope for Wisconsin’s offense, despite Michigan’s strong presence in net. Opponents have outscored Michigan by a 10-4 margin in the second half, and Trask anticipates his team will keep pushing to find the back of the net.
“The team has created some very good chances in past games, and it just wasn’t meant to be,” Trask said. “Sometimes that happens in soccer, where you just don’t get the rub of the ball. Hopefully it will go our way on Saturday, if the soccer gods smile on us a little bit.”
The Wolverines have a challenging schedule with five matchups against ranked teams. Michigan is 0-4 against ranked opponents this season and travels to No. 3 Akron next week.
“Michigan has been up and down this year. They have had some really great results in conference, and feel good about what they are doing this season,” Trask said. “We expect them to be very good. They have a lot of individual talent. We know we are in for a big battle.”
The Badgers appear set for the challenge, as Wisconsin’s defense has kept the team in contention during several tight matches, including against No. 4 Marquette. As the season goes on, the defense expects this level of play to continue through November.
“The defense has been working and training hard the last couple of weeks, and we are coming together. We have two good goalies and a pretty experienced backline,” Cochran said. “We are going to continue to keep working together and hopefully keep putting together good performances.”
With six games left in the regular season, Wisconsin has ground to make up. With three regular season Big Ten games remaining, the Badgers currently have a 0-2 conference record.
The Badgers can capture their first conference win at home – and of the season – against Michigan. Trask is looking for his team to turn its season around and contend in the Big Ten tournament.
“The team has some opportunities at home. We have to win games if we want to get into the middle of the pack going into the Big Ten Tournament,” Trask said. “It is very rare that teams go undefeated in the Big Ten these days. People knock each other off, so if we can start getting some results we can get right in the middle of the pack.”