The No. 9 Georgetown men’s soccer team won both of its matches over the weekend, improving to a 2-0-2 record. After double overtime ties against No. 12 Indiana (3-0-1) and No. 5 Notre Dame (2-0-1), the team defeated Harvard (0-2-0) on Friday 2-0 and Wisconsin (1-3-0) on Sunday by a score of 4-1.

The Hoyas scored early in both games, never trailing during the weekend. Senior midfielder and captain Tyler Rudy opened up the scoring in the 12th minute of the game against Harvard with an impressive long-range shot to the bottom right corner of the goal. The goal was the mirror image of one Rudy scored last season against Princeton in a 3-2 win.

“It was my last first home game, so I was really excited for it,” Rudy said. “Actually it’s funny, [senior defender] Jared Rist said before the game that you are playing an Ivy [League] team so you are probably going to score today.”

Despite controlling the majority of possession and creating several chances, most notably in the 23rd minute when a shot by junior forward Brandon Allen just missed wide right, the game remained 1-0 at halftime.

The second half proved to be a much different game, with the Hoyas struggling to maintain possession and exploit the space behind the defense left by a pressing Harvard team. Senior goalkeeper and captain Tomas Gomez was forced into all three of his saves in the second half, including a one-on-one save in the 78th minute to preserve the lead. An 86th-minute late goal by freshman midfielder Arun Basuljevic — the first of his career — secured victory for the Hoyas.

“We have to be better at understanding the ability to keep the ball and being patient and waiting for spaces. If you look at the last 20 minutes of that game there were some pretty nice spaces to play and we did not take advantage of that,” Head Coach Brian Wiese said.

Many of those issues were corrected in Sunday’s 4-1 win against Wisconsin. Allen scored in the fifth minute of the game, redirecting a cross from junior defender and captain Keegan Rosenberry around the goalkeeper. In the 30th minute, junior forward Melvin Snoh entered the game as a substitute and scored on his first touch of the game just seconds later, and sophomore forward Alex Muyl drove through the defense and scored shortly afterward to make the game 3-0 at the half.

This time, the Hoyas continued to control the game after the break, creating another goal 37 seconds into the second half as Wisconsin allowed Muyl space to shoot. Unlike Harvard, Wisconsin was unable to consistently pressure Georgetown, managing only one shot on goal in the second half that required nothing but a routine save by Gomez.

The Badgers’ lone goal was scored from a controversial 66th-minute penalty kick given on a foul by sophomore defender Joshua Yaro. Wiese and the Georgetown captains protested the decision at the time.

Wiese did not let the surrendered goal mar his positive outlook on a successful weekend.

“If you look at … what we’ve been talking about with them the last couple weeks and obviously after the Harvard game, I thought, to the team’s credit, they did a really good job addressing some of those things,” Wiese said.

One of the most significant reasons for the team’s success over the weekend was the offense’s ability to create chances. Georgetown had 21 shots over the two-game stretch, compared to 15 combined shots for its opponents. Eight different players had either a goal or an assist over the weekend, including Snoh and Allen who had at least one of each. This balancing and deep offensive attack is a luxury that allows the team to substitute players without losing quality, which in turns wears out defenses.

Though many players made an impact on the offensive side of the ball, Allen and Muyl stood out, as they were involved in all four goals scored against Wisconsin. Add in the fact that this is Muyl’s first season as a forward, and the striking duo’s chemistry becomes even more impressive.

“We’ve been working on that all preseason, trying to get our partnership together,” Muyl said. “If we keep doing what we did today, that is going to be dangerous. Other teams are going to have to worry about that.”

The Hoyas finished the weekend with six goals, compared to just one allowed, and two comfortable wins against non conference opponents. With further home games against Virginia Commonwealth University (2-2-0) and No. 17 UC Irvine (3-0-0) looming, Wiese is pleased with how his team has performed.

“Two wins is two wins. With the schedule we play, sometimes they are going to be pretty and sometimes they are going to be pretty ugly,” Wiese said. “The fact that we are 2-0-2 playing the four games we have played puts us in a really good spot.”