I Wish College Soccer Had xG: Marquette 3, Villanova 2

The Golden Eagles are on top of the Midwest Division in the Big East after opening league play with a victory!

You guys know about the concept of expected goals, right? A computation of quality of shot attempt, and relative to that computation, a calculation of how many goals you should have scored in a soccer match?

Yeah.

So, I want to know what Marquette men’s soccer’s xG was for their 3-2 win over Villanova on Friday afternoon in Pennsylvania.

Here’s why: Two of Marquette’s shots were penalty kicks, with Mitar Mitrovic converting both for goals. On top of that, the Golden Eagles outshot 24-15 in the match…. But 15 of MU’s shots were on goal. There’s the three shots that actually went for goals, and then the TWELVE saves that VU keeper Alex Yagudayev made.

I feel like Marquette’s xG might be north of 4, which is wild.

The scoring got started at the Higgins Soccer Complex in the seventh minute. Villanova made a nice push down the right hand side, slid a pass towards the middle of the box, and Colby Raymond collected and deposited it past MU keeper Marten Brink. To reiterate a point from last match: I’m going to need Brink to start being much more aggressive because I think he was much too passive on this attempt.

I would show you the goal, but Villanova’s social media team is apparently unable to pull video clips and post them.

Marquette got level in the 9th minute when Villanova got called for a handball in the box. It was kind of a very silly handball seeing as it was a bouncing ball ticketed out of bounds and the VU player leapt into the air and ended up batting it away. In any case, Mitrovic calmly stepped to the spot after a VAR review, and went low to the left to score.

MU kept the pressure up, and eventually that led to the second penalty call of the first half. It came in the 22nd minute, Villanova made a clearing attempt, but it went sideways on them and the Wildcats ended up fouling Karim Abdoul Pare in the air. That’s enough for a PK for this ref, and again: Mitrovic scores to the left, presumably because Yagudayev figured he wouldn’t go there again and dove to the right.

And that wasn’t it for goals in the first half.

Marquette’s 2-1 lead lasted about 11 minutes. Villanova played a loooooong ball forward, one that the camera crew had a hard time keeping up with, and Jordan Canica was able to slot it past Brink as he came out to make a challenge away from the goal line. It was a kind of quiet 11 minutes with just one shot each in between Mitrovic’s second penalty kick and Canica’s goal. Brink made a save not that much longer later on a ball lofted straight at him — and the PBP on the Flo FC broadcast finally started up not long after that — and the Golden Eagles forced Yagudayev into making two saves in the final 10 minutes of the period to keep the thing level at the break.

Shots were 15-6 favoring Marquette in the first 45 minutes, and things slowed down after the break, even with the second half starting with the score tied up. It took more than 12 minutes for both teams to put up two shots each, but they made the most of them with all four shots coming on frame. In fact most of the shots in the second half ended up on goal as the two teams combined for 18 shots and 11 saves…….. but there was a 12th shot on goal, and that came from Ryan Amond in the 67th minute.

At least Marquette’s game winner was a pretty looking goal.

It was a well deserved goal for Amond. Just moments earlier, he came up big out in front of Brink, scooting forward to launch a ball away from the box. Abdoul Pare made some fancy footwork looking for a good shot, but VU’s defense appeared to clear it out, but it bounced right to Amond as he followed the play down the field, and he just let it fly to bury the game winner.

It wasn’t completely over, as Villanova managed three more shots the rest of the way. Their best came in the final minute of play, and Marten Brink had to come up big for Marquette to seal the 3-2 win.

It wasn’t complicated, but he had to make the play in a critical moment, and that’s what’s important.

Oh, hey, by the way: MARQUETTE IS IN FIRST PLACE IN THE BIG EAST MIDWEST DIVISION.

As I type this, the only matches to go final today are MU/VU and DePaul/UConn, both cross-divisional games. The Huskies got the 3-2 win there, so no one else in the Midwest as a win yet, but all 12 teams are in action with everyone starting at 6pm Central.

Up Next: Marquette will be off until next week Saturday. That will bring Butler to Valley Fields for a Big East match with first kick set for 7pm Central. The Bulldogs are 3-2-2 at the moment, and they trail Akron 4-3 past the hour mark in their Big East opener. They’ll also host Wright State on Tuesday before coming up to Milwaukee.