Milwaukee City Wire

The Milwaukee men's soccer team played to a 0-0 draw against St. Thomas on Tuesday evening at South Field in St. Paul, Minnesota. Goalkeeper Nic Diana secured his second consecutive shutout for the Panthers, who now hold a record of 1-2-4 this season.

Head coach Kris Kelderman commented on the team's performance: "To get a point, on the road, on a 90-degree day when you are on turf which makes it even hotter … I thought it was a very good defensive effort by our team," Kelderman said. "Specifically, the goalkeeping and our backline. That's our second game in a row where we've had a shutout, which is not easy to do in college soccer regardless of who you play. But it was a very good effort from our guys in a not-so-easy environment."

Diana made two saves during the match as Milwaukee's defense limited St. Thomas' opportunities. The Tommies also recorded their third shutout of the season, continuing what has become a school-record start for them.

Kelderman addressed the team's defensive approach: "First things first, defensively we have been very sound and that is something we are pretty pleased with right now," he said. "We keep emphasizing that if you're hard to play against and keep yourself in the game, you give yourself a chance to win the game. That's what we have been doing, we just have to get a little bit sharper in the attacking third. Once we get a little bit healthier and get some numbers back, we are hoping that comes around and we will be a little more complete."

St. Thomas maintained possession early in the match but mostly circulated the ball within its own defensive third before Milwaukee began creating more chances later in the first half. Alejandro Zuniga nearly scored for Milwaukee with an attempt over the crossbar in the 26th minute.

The most significant opportunity came in the 38th minute when Pavle Ivkovic sent a long pass downfield to Ryan Berghauer, whose shot was saved by St. Thomas' goalkeeper.

In the second half, both teams struggled offensively with few sustained attacks. Zuniga again tested St. Thomas with another shot in the 74th minute that went wide after being pushed away by their keeper. Fernando Pirry had another late chance for Milwaukee but saw his attempt blocked inside the box.

Milwaukee finished with slight leads in shots (9-8) and corner kicks (7-6). Both teams committed nine fouls each while St. Thomas held 57 percent of possession during the match.

"There were not a lot of shots, but we had one really good look I'd like to think that we should have finished," Kelderman said. "But at this time, we are just a bit challenged with finishing some chances offensively. We went into today's game a couple of numbers down, missing a couple of starters in our front line. That hurt us a bit in our attack today."

Milwaukee will resume Horizon League play Saturday when they travel to Indiana to face IU Indy at 4 p.m.