IU ties Michigan 2-2, fails to beat Wolverines for 1st time ever

The Wolverines walked off the field and entered a joyous locker room. The Hoosiers kept their heads down. The game didn't end in a Michigan victory, but to the maize and blue it might as well have. \nFor the first time in team history, the IU men's soccer team did not beat Michigan. Instead, the Hoosiers tied the Wolverines 2-2 Sunday afternoon.\n"Regardless of who we play, that was unacceptable," senior defender Julian Dieterle said. "It doesn't matter who that was .... What matters is how we're playing, and right now we're not getting things done."\nMost upsetting to the Hoosiers was their slow start at the beginning of the game. \nIn the fifth minute, a Hoosier defender tackled Michigan forward Peri Marosevic in the IU penalty box, giving the Wolverines a penalty kick early in the game. \nMichigan defender Michael Holody sent the kick from 12 yards out past IU goalkeeper Chay Cain into the lower left corner of the goal to give the Wolverines an early 1-0 lead. \nThe Michigan offensive attack continued less than 15 minutes later. In the 19th minute, Marosevic played the ball up to teammate Kevin Hall, who wove between two IU defenders and sent the ball past Cain to pad the Wolverine lead to 2-0. \n"The ball was kind of just bouncing, and somehow it got through," Cain said about Hall's goal. "He kind of caught me flatfooted and snuck it in."\nIU coach Mike Freitag knows his team can't compete with slow starts.\n"You can't come out for the first 15 minutes and stand and watch and hope something's going to happen," Freitag said. "We're not good enough to give teams two goals and then try to play catch up."\nHis team was able to catch up, though. It just took time. \nIn the 34th minute, the Hoosiers were given a penalty kick of their own when IU forward Darren Yeagle was tackled in Michigan's penalty box. Hoosier forward Kevin Robson sent his penalty kick in nearly the same location Holody sent his. He got the same result, putting the Hoosiers on the board at 2-1.\nWith little more than 20 minutes remaining in the game, Robson found the net again with a blast from 30 yards out into the upper right corner of the net. \nThe game went into overtime, and both the Hoosier and Wolverine offensive attacks had their chances. Each team had three shots on goal between the two overtime periods. Michigan and IU had three shots on goal in regulation combined. In the future, Freitag hopes the Hoosiers won't have to exert any effort in overtime.\n"We shouldn't have to play 110 minutes; we should play 90 minutes and get it over with," Freitag said. \nDieterle, Cain and Robson agree the key to more Hoosier wins is playing with intensity for all 90 minutes. With a two-goal lead, the Michigan defense was able to keep five men stationed at the 18-yard line to try to prevent an IU goal. \n"If you come out like we did and give two early goals, you're definitely going to give them a chance to sit back like they did," Robson said. "Luckily we got back in the game and made a couple good goals, but we can't dig ourselves holes like that because teams are going to do that against us because they're going to want to walk out of here with at least a tie"