Peterson nets hat trick as IU wins

Sophomore Jacob Peterson put on a show for his home state as the IU men's soccer team moved to 6-2 while opening up its Big Ten season in East Lansing, Mich., by defeating Michigan State 3-1 at Old College Field. The Portage, Mich., native scored all three goals as he joined a group of three former IU players and one current IU player, junior midfielder Mike Ambersley, to score a hat trick in a game.\nAmbersley's hat trick came in 2001 against Michigan.\nIn last year's game against Michigan State at Bill Armstrong Stadium, the Spartans came down to Bloomington and tied IU, 1-1. That was the first time in 31 tries the Hoosiers did not defeat the Spartans.\n"I remember two years ago (at Michigan State) when we came out and smacked them 6-1 and I'm sure they had a little revenge factor last season," IU senior Danny O'Rourke said. "It feels good to come out here on their home turf to show we are still the team to beat in the Big Ten." \nPeterson's first goal for No. 10 IU came in the 56th minute on a crossing pass from O'Rourke. This was the first goal for the Hoosiers in 260 minutes -- which goes back to last weekend's two-game tournament in Albuquerque, N.M., where IU lost both matches in double-overtime.\nSunday's game against MSU was the first game back for O'Rourke since he sat out the game against New Mexico Sept. 19. O'Rourke received two yellow cards against UC-Santa Barbara Sept. 18, resulting in his ejection from that match and the automatic one-game suspension against New Mexico.\n"We just keep getting better," O'Rourke said. "We played real well out West, but our scores didn't show it. We played a good 90 minutes today and there is always stuff we need to work on."\nIU's second goal came in the 60th minute when sophomore forward Kevin Robson cut across the box from left to right and dropped the ball to Peterson who then one-timed the ball into the net.\nThe Spartans (5-2 overall, 0-1 Big Ten) scored late in the second half when Munster, Ind., native Ryan McMahen scored in the 87th minute to pull MSU within one goal. McMahen's goal came on a free kick from about 25 yards out when the ball went through a crowd of bodies from both teams and found its way under the crossbar in the upper left corner of the net.\nIU scored its final goal when O'Rourke found Peterson in the front third of the field -- which put Peterson in a one-on-one situation with Spartan sophomore goalkeeper Jason Tillman. Peterson placed his shot into the left side of the net and secured his first career hat-trick.\n"It feels pretty good to score a hat trick, but as long as our team can collectively get some goals, I don't really care if its me or anyone else that scores," Peterson said.\nThe three other Hoosiers to score a hat trick in a game are Todd Yeagley against Penn State in 1991, Harry Weiss against Northwestern in 1995 and Matt Fundenberger against Michigan in 2000.\nPeterson now has six goals on the season, three of which are game winners.\n"(Michigan State) is a tough place to play," IU coach Mike Freitag said. "I've been up here a lot of time where we've stunk it up and I thought we played pretty well today. To their credit they put some pressure on late."\n"It is very important to get back on the winning track. Some teams can question themselves after coming up on the short end, and this team shouldn't question themselves." \nThe Hoosiers outshot Michigan State 6-1 in the first half, while Michigan State came back in the second half to outshoot IU 10-7.\n"Our players are very disappointed right now," Michigan State coach Joe Baum said in a statement. "We really believed we had a chance to win going into the game. We had some great chances in the second half, but we just couldn't finish." \n-- Contact staff writer Steve Slivka at smslivka@indiana.edu.