It's back, and at the perfect time too.

The Penn State men's soccer team showed its offense is alive and well last night, scoring two goals en route to a 2-0 victory over Northwestern in the first round of the Big Ten tournament, hosted by Wisconsin.

The Nittany Lions have shown throughout this season that their defense is one of the most dominant squads in college soccer. However, their offense, though getting chances, was not putting the ball in the goal.

That has changed in the last two games as the Lions have scored five goals. They may not have been scoring as many goals as they would have liked to before their last two games, but the Lions always knew that they had the capability to score big.

"This team is capable of scoring a lot of goals against any team at any given time," assistant coach Marlon LeBlanc said. "Sometimes the goals fall and sometimes they don't."

The offense's resurgence is not due to one player but to an entire team effort. Last night six players were involved with the scoring. Two of those players were freshmen. Freshman midfielder Gabe Bernstein scored the first goal of the game at 26:24 off assists from senior co-captain Ricardo Villar and junior midfielder Brent Jacquette.

The second goal was deposited by freshman forward Chad Severs off an assist from junior defender Ben Dawson. The goal was Severs' fifth goal of the season, and he is currently second on the team behind Villar.

"Chad's goal was an absolute bomb and a brilliant finish," LeBlanc said.

Scoring not only gives the offense confidence, but it also gives the defense a shot in the arm. LeBlanc said that the defense has some of the pressure taken off it when the Lions have the lead.

It seems that if the Lions can muster any offense in a game they will win. Penn State has given up a paltry one goal in its last seven games and has had three shutouts in a row.

Last night's shutout and offensive production created an impressive win. It is always nice to have a win that looks good, but once a team reaches the Big Ten tournament any win is a good win.

"The task at hand is to win because if we lose we are finished," LeBlanc said. "Whether the win is ugly or pretty, it is irrelevant."

The win last night puts the Lions in the semifinals of the tournament. They will play Michigan State at 5 p.m. tomorrow to determine who will be in the championship game on Sunday.

The last time the Lions faced the Spartans they came away with a 1-0 victory in double overtime. No one knows exactly what will happen in the rematch but the Lions are excited to get into the second round of the tournament.

"Winning the Big Ten tournament has been our objective since day one of the season," LeBlanc said. "It's what we are here to do."