The Oberlin College men’s soccer team sustained two defeats this week, losing games to Carnegie Mellon University at home and Mt. Union College away, before recovering on Thursday to defeat Lake Erie College. Saturday and Tuesday’s back-to-back losses were the first setbacks in what has been a successful season thus far. The Yeomen’s record now stands at 4-2-1.
The performances and results of the first two games were in stark contrast to last weekend’s back-to-back victories. The home defeat to Carnegie Mellon was a 2-0 affair and marked the first time this season that the Yeomen had failed to score. Carnegie Mellon dominated high balls throughout the game and Oberlin recorded no shots on goal for the first half.
Sophomore Alec Potzrebowski and junior Philip Kreniske both received yellow cards in a game where Oberlin played a mostly defensive role. The Yeomen did threaten to stage a comeback late in the second half, with senior Jay Rosenthal forcing a good save from the Carnegie Mellon goalkeeper.
Away at Mt. Union, the Yeomen scored first. Even though Mt. Union equalized, the teams were well matched and balanced at halftime, which was illustrated by the 1-1 score line.
“After we grabbed the early goal, I thought we were going to get back on track with a victory,” first-year David Wilson said. “But we started to have to some breakdowns, gifted them a goal to even the score, then never really recovered after they went up a goal.”
The second half saw the Yeomen concede three goals to end the game in a 4-1 score in favor of Mt. Union.
Oberlin had not been down a goal until this week’s game and had not been required to stage a comeback.
“The biggest thing we need to work on is how we react when we go down a goal. We need to work collectively with a tactical theme in mind,” head coach Blake New said. New is already planning ahead: “We will change the way that we defend set pieces and corners and make some adjustments to improve there.”
“You can call it a hiccup, you can call it a serious matter, but here’s the bottom line. We’ve known all along that we’re a good team, but no one has said that we will never lose,” senior Will Singer said. “Our challenge now is to understand what we have to do to become a better team by the time we start playing conference games.”
“It hasn’t been an enjoyable experience,” Wilson, the scorer of Oberlin’s goal in the 4-1 loss, said, “mostly because neither defeat was a matter of the other team being superior. It’s been a problem with our preparation, and our execution of tactics.”
The Yeomen more than bounced back when they flipped the scoreline around to win 4-1 over Lake Erie College. They came out firing and took a 2-0 lead with goals from Wilson and Kreniske. Oberlin held the lead through the end of the first half.
“The basic challenge in this game was for us to stay on our game plan and not play down to their level,” senior Luke Eisenhauer said.
The Yeomen succeeded in sticking with their game plan even after Lake Erie managed to put a goal in on a breakaway in the second half. Oberlin stayed composed and went on to score two more, coming from first-year Robert Stupp and Kreniske.
“We had a lot of great overlapping runs from the outside defenders,” Eisenhauer said. “That was the highlight of the game, they got a lot of good crosses off.”
The team has faced and lost two games to the demons of disorganization, but recovered midweek to defeat Lake Erie.
“The real proving ground will be this Saturday,” Eisenhauer said. “We’re still proving to ourselves that we can implement our tactical plan under pressure.”
The Yeomen will face Muskingum College tomorrow on the road.