The 1-1 tie with Lafayette on Sept. 7 felt more like a loss for Villanova men’s soccer. One week later, a 2-2 draw with Fairleigh Dickinson felt more like a win.
The draw on Saturday, Sept. 14 puts the Wildcats at 0-4-3 on the season.
Head coach Mark Fetrow saw some improvement from his team and emphasized that they did a lot of things well, despite not coming out with a win.
“I thought for the majority of the game we did a really good job with our possessions…playing quickly, having more extended possessions from our middle third to the attacking third and creating some really good chances,” Fetrow said. “I think the stat[s] said 20 shots by the end of the game, and I felt like we could have scored a couple more goals, so I think that was some really good improvement.”
By the 22nd minute, the Wildcats had already recorded five of those 20 total shots. The ‘Cats would go on to record eight total shots in the first half alone.
One of those shots was taken by sophomore midfielder Josh Oladele. Oladele nearly had the breakthrough in the 35th minute when his shot from 22 yards out went just wide of goal.
Just before halftime, the Wildcats were awarded a free kick. The kick was taken by graduate midfielder Jason Bouregy, whose ball found freshman defender Luke Haggerty. Haggerty’s shot was on target but cleared by the FDU defense.
At halftime the game was tied and both teams were still searching for the game’s first goal.
Coming out of halftime, the game continued to be tightly contested. Neither team was able to find an immediate breakthrough.
It took 23 minutes of the second half, but eventually, the Wildcats capitalized on the counter.
In the 68th minute, graduate forward Colby Raymond scored off an assist from Oladele.
The lead lasted just three minutes.
In the 71st minute FDU equalized. Six minutes later, it took the lead.
For the remainder of the game, it looked as if the Wildcats were going to suffer their fourth loss of the season but senior forward Vincent Petrera had other plans.
For the second weekend in a row, Petrera scored the tying goal but this time he did so in the 87th minute.
Coming back after conceding has proved to be one of the Wildcats strong suits.
“I think that’s been really consistent with our guys all year,” Fetrow said. “They’re workers… They want to win every game. They want to win every moment and they never give up on it.”
Another positive was Bouregy was credited with the assist to Petrera’s goal. He and Petrera have started to form a strong understanding of each other on the pitch. Bouregy also assisted Petrera’s equalizer against Lafayette.
When asked about the connection between his two players, Fetrow emphasized their playmaking and goal scoring abilities.
“Jason [Bouregy] is a guy that we expect to produce with goals and assists,” Fetrow said. “He’s starting to get in a good rhythm here and Vince [Petrera] is a guy we expect to be on the end of it and score goals. We want them to keep building that connection as well as the connectivity with everyone around them.”
The Wildcats will have six days before their next game. This gives Fetrow and his staff plenty of time to deepen those connections and fine tune any tactics before the biggest stretch of the season.
Villanova will be back in action on Friday, Sep. 20, hosting Marquette in the first Big East game of the year at 4 p.m.
Although the Wildcats return from New Jersey without a win, they do return with momentum and even more determination to secure their first win on the opening day of conference play.
“Big East play opens on Friday and our record is 0-0,” Fetrow said. “For us, we have everything to play for. We started the season saying that we wanted to be Big East Champions… We want to minimally be one of the top eight teams so we can be in the Big East playoffs and get back to where we think we should be every year…That’s gonna be the driving force.”
