The Marquette men’s soccer team had its hands full when it took on Wisconsin-Parkside and Wisconsin-Whitewater Saturday at Valley Fields.

For starters, the games were played not on the normal grass field that the team is used to playing on, but the FieldTurf surface adjacent to the typical game field. The FieldTurf surface can cause more unusual bounces, which can be difficult to adjust to when the majority of games and practices are played on natural grass.

Additionally, fatigue can be difficult for players to adjust to in the spring when the games are much more sporadic, even for single game, let alone two 90-minute matches against difficult opponents, such as UW-Parkside and UW-Whitewater.

Consequently, coach Louis Bennett took advantage of his expanded roster by playing his typical starters for about one half each game. The rest of the time was allotted mostly for new recruits who will be joining the team next season as well as reserves that need the extra time to get into shape and gain more valuable experience.

Sophomore goalkeeper Ben Calvopina, who appears the frontrunner to replace departed keeper Matt Pyzdrowski, started and played all 90 minutes of the UW-Whitewater contest and was rarely tested by the Warhawks’ offense in the 1-0 victory.