Finding itself behind on two separate occasions, No. 7 Notre Dame fought back and survived a challenge from Marquette, 4-2, Tuesday night at Alumni Stadium.
Graduate student defender and captain Max Lachowecki buried the game winner in the 80th minute to give the Irish (7-2-1, 2-1-0 ACC) a hard-fought victory over the Golden Eagles (3-3-2, 0-0-1 Big East).
Lachowecki pounded a feed from sophomore forward Jon Gallagher past Marquette freshman goalkeeper Luis Barraza from eight yards out for his second goal of the season just six minutes after senior defender Michael Shipp tied the contest at 2-2.
“Usually I don’t veer too far forward … but I was like, ‘You know what? It’s so open,’ so I started heading that way,” Lachowecki said. “Nobody’s really around me, so I’m screaming at [Gallagher] to cross it, and he plays me a great ball. Somehow I took a touch on my right foot, didn’t mess it up, put it on my favorite left foot and shot it.”
Lachowecki said the team maintained its composure despite the two deficits.
“We’re confident in any game we go into that if we go down a goal, we have to have that mindset that we can come back like we did tonight,” Lachowecki said.
“We showed a lot of resilience tonight,” senior midfielder Patrick Hodan said. “To be honest, the first 15, 20 minutes of the game were pretty poor on our part … but at the end of the day it’s a win. To come back, it’s not ideal, but we got the job done.”
“There was no panic,” Irish head coach Bobby Clark said. “I felt that was quite clear when we went behind both times. There was no panic, and they stayed together.”
The Golden Eagles got off to the blazing start in the seventh minute, as redshirt senior forward C. Nortey made a run down the left flank and sent a shot towards Irish junior goalkeeper Chris Hubbard. Hubbard got his fingertips on the ball at a full extension, but the rebound ricocheted right to redshirt senior forward David Selvaggi standing on the doorstep to put the Irish down early.
Hodan and senior midfielder Evan Panken got the Irish going in the 19th minute. Panken forced a turnover at the top of the Marquette box and fed a pass through to Hodan, who was sliding in from the right flank. Hodan collected the ball and slipped it through a crowd to tie the game at one.
It was Hodan’s first goal of the season after he led the Irish with nine goals last year.
“It’s definitely nice to finally get one,” Hodan said. “But at the end of the day, the most important thing is we won.”
“If we can win games, and he’s not scoring, then I’m fine with it, but if he’s scoring, I think we’re a pretty dangerous team,” Lachowecki said of Hodan. “Once he catches higher, he’s pretty hard to stop, so hopefully that will continue.
“Anytime he gets around the box, he can do things that other people can’t, so we just let him do his thing, and eventually it all works out.”
Hodan looked to bury his second of the night in the 39th minute, but his free-kick blast from 25 yards was knocked aside by Barraza to keep the game scoreless at the half.
Marquette broke the tie in the 67th minute, when Nortey received a through ball from freshman forward Toby Howell. Nortey calmly collected the pass and stepped around an Irish defender before burying a left-footed shot into the bottom-left corner of the net from six yards out.
Shipp played the first hero in the 74th minute for Notre Dame, floating a cross from the right flank over everyone that found the far post and bounced across the line to tie the game once again. It was Shipp’s second goal of the year, with an assist from Hodan for his third point of the night.
“I’m sure he’ll say it was intentional, but it was a good teasing ball to the back post, and it somehow snuck in,” Hodan said of Shipp’s goal. “Sometimes you need a little luck every once and a while.”
The captain Lachowecki buried the winner just six minutes later off the feed from Gallagher to put the Irish in front for the first and only time all game. Gallagher buried his sixth of the season with 82 seconds remaining to seal the match for the Irish.
Notre Dame is next in action at 1 p.m. Sunday on the road at North Carolina State in Raleigh, North Carolina.
