Butler buries Hoosiers, 4-1

Five times this season, the IU men’s soccer team has come into the fight as the lower-ranked squad. Four times, IU has walked away with the victory.

No. 5 UCL-who? Bye bye No. 11 Creighton. See ya No. 10 Michigan State.
But Wednesday, No. 25 IU was just a puppy when No. 8 Butler Bulldogs (14-0-1) beat them 4-1.

But the Bulldogs are riding a perfect season for a reason. They played as a team.

They took their shots, and they sealed a first goal that was basically set at the feet of their freshman forward en route to a victory.

Butler came into Bloomington with the bark of a top-10 team, but in the end, IU bit itself.

The visitors were looking for anything — an open shot, a breakaway run or an IU slip-up.

In the 15th minute, Butler sent a shot into the box, and sophomore goalkeeper Luis Soffner enclosed his hands around the ball. He went to roll the ball back out, a natural motion Soffner has made multiple times in every game he’s ever played, but instead a fluke roll happened.

“I was trying to throw it to Andy (Adlard) on the sidelines,” Soffner said. “Right before I threw it, I saw their guy sprinting from the back right up to Andy, so I just kind of second guessed myself and tried to pull it back in. I was already halfway through the motion, and it just kind of slipped out when I was trying to pull it back. That was unfortunate.”

Butler freshman forward Austin Oldham found Soffner’s slipped ball at his feet. He pulled his leg back and released the trigger, scoring Butler’s first goal.

Then, almost 30 minutes later, Butler scored again on a long shot from 30 yards out. Soffner looked up and watched the ball sail in the box above him — 2-0 Butler.

A Butler celebration 41 seconds later gave the Bulldogs a 3-0 lead at the half.

“We just made a few mistakes,” Adlard said. “We were giving them chances that they shouldn’t have got. I don’t want to take too much credit away from them because I thought they played a great game. But we did give them a couple chances that we should have easily turned around or dealt with.”

In a game almost five years to the day, IU was down 3-0 at the half against Maryland.

It was Oct. 29, 2005, and IU scored the three goals they needed to bring the game to a tie, but neither team was able to score in overtime.

Unfortunately, IU wasn’t able to pull off such a feat on Jerry Yeagley Field last night. IU coach Todd Yeagley pulled Soffner from the pitch at the half, and junior Nate Mitchell made two saves in the second half.

“Luis was rattled a bit,” Yeagley said. “That first goal bothered him. I think it affected him on his communication, on his presence and certainly on the second goal. We just wanted to have a sharp, focused, ready goalkeeper.

“I haven’t lost confidence in Luis, but you have to continue to evaluate and understand we can’t put ourselves in that situation early in the game, and that was a controllable.”

Junior forward Will Bruin was able to put away goal No. 13 of the season eight minutes into the second half to give IU its lone goal.

“I’ve never seen a team shoot that well personally,” Bruin said. “They hit some bombs from outside, and I look forward to playing them again if we get another chance.”

Butler took 13 shots to IU’s 11, but Butler won on the capitalizationof IU mistakes and on the Hoosiers’ frustration and loss of concentration from the defense in the first half.

The final seconds had ticked off the clock, and IU stood in a circle around their first-year coach. Yeagley wasn’t yelling or pointing. He was being realistic.

It was a non-conference loss. It’s something the team learns from. Sunday’s game against Northwestern, where the team could clinch the Big Ten title, is the game in which they don’t want to be making these mistakes.

“Nothing’s lost in this game,” Yeagley said. “We’re a competitive group. We want to win every game, but in the scope of the season, Sunday’s game is the game that we need to focus for and get ready.”