A trend is starting to develop for the No. 2 Penn State men's soccer team.
In their 2-1 overtime defeat of College of Charleston (2-3-1) on Friday night and their 1-0 victory against No. 9 Virginia Commonwealth (4-1-1) on Saturday in the Penn State Nike Classic, the Nittany Lions (6-0-0) put up 36 shots while surrendering a total of eight.
In six games this season, the Lions have never been outshot by their opponent and they have only given up more than 10 shots in a game once for a shot advantage of 125-35.
Although the shots have been flying in left and right, the goals haven't been too frequent, especially at home. In their three home games, the Lions have put up 60 shots but only capitalized on five of them.
Despite not putting it away very frequently, Penn State coach Barry Gorman sees the team's goal scoring as something that's inevitable with the amount of shots the Lions are getting.
"Soccer's such a game that you're not going to expect to blow other teams out of the water," the Penn State coach said. "It's the law of averages, sooner or later you're going to score. If you're not creating the chances you get worried, but we are creating the chances so the goals will come."
In Friday's game against Charleston, the Lions created 22 chances and the goals did come.
The only first-half goal came six minutes before halftime when senior midfielder Pete Shellenberger served a cross from the corner, which was redirected off the head of sophomore midfielder Brent Jacquette and past the College of Charleston goalkeeper Wes Martino.
That single goal held up for 42 minutes when, with nine minutes left, Charleston midfielder Mark Gaskin broke away from the defense and Penn State goalkeeper Ryan Sickman deflected the ball back and Gaskin buried the ball in the open net.
"He got through us and I made the decision to go get it," Sickman said. "That deflection back in front of him only happens one out of a hundred times."
The possibility of an upset of the Lions only lasted for about 10 minutes, when only two minutes into the overtime session, Shellenberger dished the ball to junior midfielder Derek Potteiger, who struck the ball from outside the goalie box past Martino for the game-winning goal.
"The shot was mine for the taking, so I thought I had to take that shot," Derek Potteiger said. "Every single guy out there was taking responsibility and I am assured that if anyone else was in my position they would have taken that shot."
In Saturday's game against Virginia Commonwealth, their first game against a nationally ranked opponent, the Lions again outshot their opponent, 14-4.
Virginia Commonwealth's offensive attack was hampered when midfielder Ignacio Talamante received a red card for several incidents of flagrant play, leaving the Rams down a player and forcing VCU coach Tim O'Sullivan into a more defensive alignment.
The lone goal of the game came in the 60th minute when Potteiger, taking a pass from Brett Forbrich and Ben Dawson, set up in front of the goalie box and delivered a strike past the diving VCU goalkeeper for his second game-winning goal of the weekend.
Potteiger realized that the win against a nationally ranked opponent would temporarily hush the critics of the Penn State's No.2 ranking.
"I think it was a good test for us. We hadn't played any top-ranked teams and a lot of the country was questioning us on how we were going to play," the 1998 All-Big Ten selection said. "I think tonight we proved that we deserve to be one of the top-ranked teams in the nation."
The fourth team in the classic, Ohio State (4-1-1) earned a tie versus Virginia Commonwealth on Friday and defeated the College of Charleston 2-1 on Saturday.
The Nittany Lions hope to resume their trends on Saturday at 3:00 when they take on Michigan in Ann Arbor.
