The soccer team continued their winning streak this past week, defeating Clark University 5-0 last Saturday and Worcester Polytechnic Institute 3-0 last Tuesday. With the victories, the Judges improved their record to a perfect 6-0-0 on the current season.

Coach Michael Coven noted he was quite pleased with his team's performance following Saturday's match at Clark.
"I think yesterday was the best game we played all year," Coven said after the defeat of Clark. "We were 5-0 going into the game, but I don't think we had played particularly well. Our goalkeepers have been forced to make some pretty good saves, and we weren't scoring a lot of goals."

In that game, the Judges got on the board in the 14th minute when forward Tyler Savonen '15 scored off a throw in from fellow forward Tudor Livadaru '14. Savonen had an assist himself to Livadaru in just two minutes after the aforementioned goal. Livadaru kicked in a rebound, which Savonen shot off a Clark defenseman to give Brandeis the 2-0 lead heading into half time.

The Judges added onto their lead early on in the second half, as the Cougars scored an own goal. The final two tallies came from midfielders Josh Berg '17 and Kyle Feather '14 in the 75th and 76th minute, respectively, to put the game out of reach for Clark.

It was Berg's first collegiate goal and Feather's fourth this season.

Coven explained that the turning point in the game came as Berg entered the field and forward Sam Ocel '13 moved from forward to midfield. From there, the Judges began to win contested balls in the middle.

"With [midfielder] Jake Picard '16 still not feeling well, I moved [Ocel] from forward to midfield, and that helped quite a bit because he's an aggressive player. He started winning the balls in the middle of the field," Coven explained. "And then I inserted Josh Berg and the whole game turned around once I put him in-he just won everything."

It seemed like it would be a different type of game against WPI-at least, until the 23rd minute. The Judges were tied at 0-0 with the Engineers until, in the 23rd minute, the referee awarded a penalty to Brandeis and gave a red card to a WPI defenseman for a handball that, according to the referee, stopped a clear goal. Ocel took the kick and sent it into the net, scoring his second goal of the season.

Five minutes later, defenseman Conor Lanahan '16 headed in another goal to give Brandeis a 2-0 lead.

The second half had one more Judges goal, this time a tap in by forward Matt Peabody '13, who missed last season due to injury. It was Peabody's first goal since 2010, and one that did not go unnoticed by Coven. "That was great-that made my day for me to see Peabs go and finish it up. That was a nice goal," he said. "He was at the right place. It was the only goal we scored off the flow. Good build-up and a nice finish."

Though Brandeis came away with the victory last Tuesday, Coven did not like the way his team played overall.

"[Grinding out the win] can only go so far," said Coven. "We got the win but we were playing an average team [who was a] man down. The fact that we didn't beat them by a lot bothers me, but we were a man up and we let them have opportunities to get good shots. [Goalkeeper Joe] Graffy '15 had to make three or four very good saves."

Ocel agreed with Coven's notion that the win was not pretty, adding that the reason could just be from a lack of chemistry early on in the current season.

"We're getting the hang of it. It's a new group of guys playing different positions. I don't think we've put it all together but we're almost there."

The Judges have a tough schedule coming up, including games against conference opponents such as Case Western Reserve University and the University of Rochester. Brandeis will also re-ignite a local rivlary with Tufts University.

Coven knows his team has what it takes to keep on being successful this season, but realizes that the squad must continue to improve in all facets of the game.

"We have to dominate play in the middle of the field," Coven said. "Against some of the teams coming up, the UAA opponents, if we get four or five quality shots on goal that's going to be a lot. So we're going to have to finish up two or three or four of them."

The Judges will look to keep their winning streak going on the road, facing Wheaton College today at 4:00 p.m.