×

Soccer: Marquette offense pressures Iron Mountain in win

Iron Mountain's Ryan Hakamaki, left, takes possession of the ball against Marquette on Thursday at Commemorative Field in Kingsford. (Adam Niemi/The Daily News)

KINGSFORD — Marquette’s relentless offense persevered through four yellow cards and Iron Mountain’s strong defense in a 2-0 win on Thursday.

The Redmens’ four yellows all came in a two-minute span in the second half. The frustration on Marquette’s end from Iron Mountain’s intensity in the first half had bubbled over. A couple yellows were given for talking back to the referee.

“I talked to the guys at halftime about it — playing our game and not really worrying about it,” Marquette head coach Dan Menze said of the frustration. “I thought there were some soft calls. I thought there were some no-calls that should have been called on both teams. I thought it was both ways. I just like consistency as far as that goes.”

The Redmen came out in the second half with more poise around the ball, Menze said. Four minutes in, a cross to the middle went by one Marquette forward and rolled to the far side of the net where Rory O’Connor tapped it into the goal to break the deadlock.

“They’ve got good skills. They’re fast,” Iron Mountain head coach Dave Brule Jr. said. “There’s not a lot of weakness on their team and there hasn’t been in the 10 years that I’ve been involved.”

Trevor Salmon added another goal in the 20th minute to further sap Iron Mountain’s energy.

Menze said the main difference in the second half was playing the ball along the sidelines and, when entering the final third, passing it towards the middle. The change to playing out of the middle was because of the presence of Iron Mountain defender Michael Kulas anchoring the Mountaineers’ backfield.

“We needed to play around him and we did, so that’s how we found success. Really great team effort in the second half to get the win tonight,” Menze said. “It was playing along the sidelines and getting the late runs that really made it work for us. We were able to get numbers up. Then we moved our defenders and mids back a bit. That allowed our wingers to press up the field a little more. We could exploit that space.”

While Marquette controlled play by keeping the ball in the final third, near Iron Mountain’s goal, the Mountaineers were able to take it the other way for a handful of scoring opportunities. Kulas had a chance in the first half. Jurgen Kleiman had a shot that sailed just over the crossbar. The lack of offensive production has been the default for Iron Mountain of late.

“We’ve been struggling to score against everybody lately,” Brule said. “I tell the boys goals are like bananas — they come in bunches. Hopefully we’ll find some soon. They played well. They’re pursuing and they’re communicating well on the field.”

Both teams play in the Northland Pines Double Dual tournament this weekend. Menze said the yellow cards on his players meant he had to take them out of the game to ensure they can play in the tournament. With Marquette’s depth, Menze substituted the entire lineup before bringing them back in later.

“There were some guys that got yellow cards that I’m definitely wanting to play a little more,” Menze said. “We have a tournament and I couldn’t afford to lose them for the weekend, so kind of changed the strategy a little bit. I’ve got a ton of depth on this team so I can pretty much put out two full lines and have hardly any drop off at all. It’s really nice to be able to do that.”

Marquette 0 2 — 2

Iron Mountain 0 0 — 0

Second Half

M — Rory O’Connor, 4′

M — Trevor Salmon, 20′

Newsletter

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *
   

Starting at $4.62/week.

Subscribe Today