The rain streamed down steadily on the large Parents Weekend crowd during the national anthem Saturday night at Stevenson Field. But suddenly, as the men's soccer team took the field, the rain stopped, clearing the way for No. 6 Brown's 3-0 victory over the University of Pennsylvania.
Despite ugly conditions, Bruno's pretty play helped the team improve to 11-1-1 overall and 4-0 in the Ivy League, while the Quakers fell to 5-7-2 and 2-2 in the conference.
The match opened at a frantic pace as players slipped and struggled to control the ball due to wet conditions from the day of off-and-on rain.
"The conditions were really rough," said forward TJ Thompson '10. "It was really sloppy out there."
But Brown wasn't phased by the wet field and physical Quaker.
"At halftime I told them 'Just deal with the things you can control, that's all you can do,' " said Head Coach Mike Noonan.
The Bears threatened to take the lead a number of times early on. Less than a minute had passed when midfielder Darren Howerton '09 saved a ball from going out of bounds on the left sideline by making a sliding chip down the field to forward Kevin Davies '08, who ran onto the pass. Davies collected the ball and played a short pass from just outside the 18-yard box to fellow forward Dylan Sheehan '09 who received the ball, turned toward the net, shed his defender and then sent a left-footed shot on the ground just wide of the right post.
After a few more challenges by Brown early on, the pace of the game settled down. Neither team was able to generate genuine scoring chances for 20 minutes.
"We had a letdown in the middle of the first half," Noonan said. "But we got a goal going into halftime, which helped."
The goal resulted from a number of chances in the last 10 minutes that finally culminated in Bruno cracking the Penn defense. Defender Rhett Bernstein '09 had a number of header chances off of a trifecta of set pieces. He was first to the ball in the Penn box on a flip throw-in, a corner kick and a free kick, all within five minutes.
The Bears finally scored on a regular throw-in. With 3:52 to play in the half and deep in Penn's end, co-captain Stephen Sawyer '09 threw the ball in to Thompson with his back to the goal. He quickly chested the ball down to his feet and then slid the ball to his left for Howerton, who had snuck behind the ball-watching Penn defense. Howerton took one touch into the 18-yard box and then blasted a shot with the outside of his left foot past Penn goalkeeper Drew Healy and into the bottom left corner of the net.
The assist marked the first time that Thompson has gotten his name onto the score sheet this season.
"I just touched it over to Howie," Thompson said. "He did a great job finishing. I am happy to break the seal."
Brown's momentum carried over into the second half. The Bears attacked Penn's 4-3-3 formation down the flanks over and over again, but the Quaker defense refused to yield another good scoring chance in the first 15 minutes of the second half. Meanwhile, the game became increasingly physical, and multiple yellow cards were handed out to both sides.
"It was a tough game," Thompson said. "Every match is like that. All Ivy League games are tough."
Noonan agreed that the physicality was to be expected.
"It was a typical Ivy League game," he said. "The stakes are high and the ball was sliding around a lot."
Despite choppy play, Brown broke through again with 28:50 remaining in the game. Sheehan received the ball just inside the Penn zone and dribbled by his defender toward the net. Realizing he was beaten, the Penn player grabbed Sheehan's shirt, but Sheehan would not be stopped as he dragged the defender for five yards. The referee allowed play to continue and Sheehan played a ball to midfielder Laurent Manuel '08 at the top of the 18-yard box. Manuel touched the ball between two more Quaker defenders and ripped a left-footed laser by Healy, who had come off his line but was unable to cut down the angle enough.
This game highlighted the importance that Bruno's bench has had all season, as both Manuel and Thompson came off the bench on Saturday.
"Our bench has been fantastic," Noonan said. "One of the tell-marks of this team is that nobody cares who gets the credit. Even in practice, the guys who don't play as much push the guys who do."
Up 2-0, Brown refused to let up, as it has been prone to do at some points late in games this season. The back line of David Walls '11, Bernstein, Matt Britner '07.5 and Sawyer were a brick wall all night. The few times Penn found a hole, goalkeeper Paul Grandstrand '11 was there to shut off any chances. In one two-minute stretch with 15 minutes to play in the game, Grandstrand made one kick save with his left foot and then a diving save with his right hand.
The Bears kept their feet on the gas throughout, scoring their final goal with 10:45 left in the game. Howerton played a pass from the left wing to Thompson at the top of the box. Met with a wall of Quakers, Thompson used some fancy footwork to hold onto the ball, waiting for something to develop. Finally he pushed the ball right and dropped it behind him for Davies, who ran onto the ball and drove it by Healy to put Brown up 3-0.
"I was just holding it," Thompson said. "I thought Kevin was going to go behind me. So finally I yelled for him to come and just laid it off."
Brown's victory was Noonan's 200th as a head coach, victories split between his time at Wheaton College, the University of New Hampshire and Brown. He credits his players with his success.
"The players won 200 games," he said. "Tell me how many losses I have. I probably had more of a hand in those."
This week the team will travel to Rutgers on Wednesday and Yale on Saturday. Each game is crucial for the Bears because Dartmouth is just a half-game behind them in the Ivy League standings with a 3-0 record.
