Hoosiers advance to Big Ten Tournament Final

EVANSTON, Ill. - IU coach Mike Freitag said he is "very happy" with Sunday morning's matchup.\nThe IU men's soccer team defeated Ohio State 3-0 in the semifinals of the Big Ten Men's Soccer Tournament. The No. 3 seed Hoosiers face the No. 1 seed Penn State - who was the only team to defeat IU this season - 11 a.m., CST Sunday at the Leonard B. Thomas Athletic Complex on the campus of Northwestern University in the championship match of the Big Ten Tournament.\nThe Nittany Lions defeated No. 4 seed Michigan State 2-0 in the afternoon's first semifinal match.\nEarlier in the season, Ohio State tied IU 2-2 after the Hoosiers were up 2-1 and the Buckeyes tied the match with just under seven minutes to play.\nIU got on the scoreboard first in the 14th minute when junior forward Jacob Peterson scored his eleventh goal of the season. Junior midfielder Josh Tudela found his classmate for the one-timer, which Peterson put near post. It was Tudela's fifth assist of the season.\nPeterson scored again in the 28th minute when he got past the Buckeye defense and had a one-on-one with Ohio State goalkeeper Ray Burse Jr. The striker's shot beat Burse Jr. to his right.\n"I know Tudela, (freshman Lee) Nguyen, and (senior Mike Ambersley) are good at finding me and I always hope that I can finish," Peterson said.\nPeterson's second goal of the afternoon pushed him past former Hoosier and current assistant coach Todd Yeagley to No. 18 on the list of all-time IU goals. Peterson now has 30 goals in his three years wearing the cream and crimson.\n"I thought we had a poor first half," Ohio State head coach John Bluem said. "It was a big hill to climb in the second half, especially against Indiana."\nThe Hoosiers continued their stronghold on the match into the second half and secured their spot in the championship match when Tudela scored IU's third goal of the day in the 83rd minute. Much like Tudela's assist to Peterson on the first goal, freshman forward Kevin Noschang found Tudela for a one timer to the far post.\nTudela now has six goals this season and moves to third on the points list for the team with 17.\n"We knew going into the second half we would have to get at it and stay with it to beat Ohio State," Tudela said.\nSenior forward Brian Plotkin said it felt great to get back on the field since he had to sit out IU's 2-0 win over Wisconsin Thursday. Plotkin had to sit out the match versus the Badgers for an accumulation of five yellow cards this season.\nHe went on to say he sat on the opposite side of the field from the team during the Wisconsin game to clear his mind and that gave him a fresh bounce in his step for the Ohio State match.\nFriday afternoon's match featured six yellow cards for the Buckeyes and only one for the Hoosiers, which went to sophomore midfielder Charley Traylor in the 77th minute. The match official gave one of Ohio State's yellows to the team's bench and the Buckeyes also had 31 fouls to IU's 17.\nSophomore goalkeeper Chris Munroe recorded his ninth clean sheet of the season having only to make one save in the match.\nIU moves to 12-1-6 on the season and Ohio State falls to 10-7-2 overall. College Sports Television (CSTV) will broadcast Sunday's championship match live and the match can be seen locally on Insight Digital Cable channel 408.\n"I'm proud of the team because I feel as though Ohio State outplayed us in the first match," Freitag said. "We played some very good soccer today"