Marquette men’s soccer had its second double-overtime game in fewer than 48 hours, but unlike Friday night, Marquette could not score in the extra time, tying UC Davis 0-0 Sunday afternoon.
“The second game (of the weekend) especially, everybody felt a little tired,” redshirt sophomore Manuel Cukaj said. “The other team also had a game two days ago, so both teams were in the same situation.”
Head coach Louis Bennett said certain aspects of players’ games were not as effective because of fatigue. He pointed out examples like the crispness of players´passes.
Bennett said the players will do different activities to get rid of the lactic acid and have Tuesday off. They’ll also have a lighter session Wednesday.
“You can’t just pound and pound and pound and expect quality (and) excitement,” Bennett said. “We have to get that bounce back to our step, and we will.”
Defensively, the Golden Eagles were stout, only allowing one shot out of 15 on goal.
“(I’m) very happy … with having a clean sheet in keeping a team … that floods forward and puts a lot of people in the box,” Bennett said.
“We played well defensively,” Cukaj said. “We put pressure on them very high up the field, so we limited their chances to play out and come in front of our goal. That way … we could prevent them from scoring.”
Some players, like Cukaj, have played over 200 minutes in a 48-hour period. A normal soccer game lasts 90 minutes.
The Golden Eagles are now two games into the regular season with no losses. This is without senior co-captain Luka Prpa for both games and no senior defender Oliver Posarelli for the second game and part of the first game.
“I’m not disastrously upset, and I’m also not ecstatically pleased,” Bennett said. “We got a (tie), we’ve got an unbeaten record, we continue to be very difficult to beat at home and I think we found out a lot about ourselves.”
The Golden Eagles picked up four yellow cards, including sophomore midfielder Alan Salmeron’s second yellow card of the season.
The Golden Eagles (1-0-1) will take on University of South Florida on the road Friday at 6 p.m. CST.
