Things did not look so good for the NIU soccer team Friday afternoon as the Huskies were losing late in the first period to the 0-3 Ramblers of Loyola.

But senior Dave Weichman converted on a penalty kick to tie the game in the second half, and NIU pulled out its first victory of the year on an overtime goal by junior Michael Defort.

The first period was typical for the Huskies as they seemed to dominate the game until it came time to put the ball into the net. As coach Roy put it, “We have had trouble finishing our drives.”

The Loyola goalkeeper smothered the ball on a pass just fractions of a second before Weichman got there. Only a minute later, he hit the post on a penalty shot and then freshman Nathan Mitchell missed a head shot. All three of these situations could have put the Huskies up 3-0 but the bad luck that hindered them all season seemed to be bothering them again.

Matters got worse when Brendan Eitz scored on an assist by Eric Monton to give the Ramblers a 1-0 lead. Mitchell and Jay Konrad combined on what seemed to be the tying goal, but a penality was called on the play, resulting in the Weichman goal.

The second half got off to a slow start when the Huskies started to take charge. Ian Osharow and Joe Novy charged up the field and found Mithcell who shot high on the play. Later Novy was free on a break-away when he was pulled down from behind on the play. Near the end of the half both sides turned up the play a notch to go for the win but both came up empty as the contest went into overtime.

Loyola started out the overtime strongly as Eric Monton found the ball on a breakaway, stopped only by an excellent diving kick save by goakeeper Jeff McCall. NIU recovered from the slow start but neither team scored as they went into the second period of overtime still tied.

This time it was NIU coming out strong with two rushes on the goal. The first ended with a shot by Weichman and a save, and the second, a shot by senior Todd Moore, sailed over the goal post.

All was made up for on the play of the day when Moore got the ball in front of the goal box and danced around, freezing the defense when he found an open Defort who put the ball over the left shoulder of the goalkeeper for the winning goal.

Roy was both happy and relieved to get his first win of the season as he said, “These two teams were very nervous.” With both teams looking for their first win of the season, Roy felt that they were trying too hard for the victory.