In a return to Nickerson Field, the Boston University men’s soccer team finds itself in the wins column again with the 1-0 result over the United States Naval Academy.
From the beginning, the Terriers (4-2-0, 1-1-0 Patriot League) looked favored for the victory, recording the first five shots and four corners of the contest and taking residency in Navy’s (2-3-4, 0-1-1 PL) half for a large part of the opening frame.
With plenty of chances, the Terriers seemed due to break through.
They finally did when sophomore forward Dylan Williams’ 35th-minute attempt at goal deflected off a Navy defender. Junior forward Andrea Di Blasio then saw the opportunity to get BU up 1-0 for his second goal of the season.
After 45 minutes without a shot — let alone, one on goal — the Midshipmen matched the Terriers’ production in those areas in the second half, both teams with six shots and three on target.
“It was not a tale of two halves,” Head Coach Kevin Nylen said. “But in the second half, they created more than they did in the first half, a product of us sometimes not being as patient as we could [be].”
The victory represents junior goalkeeper William Clavier’s first regular season start in goal, and with possession tipped in favor of BU, he didn’t have too much to deal with between the posts, especially in that dominant first half.
“He played with confidence,” Nylen said of Clavier. “He was vocal. He had good positioning, and so I was really happy for him in terms of his first start and getting the win.”
Navy found their longest shift around Clavier’s 18-yard box early in the second half, taking a pair of corners and throw-ins that the Terriers took care of before heading back up the field after two minutes of defending.
Following another shift of BU’s attack, Clavier was finally forced to make his first save on the shot from Midshipmen senior forward Andrew Schug in the 57th, doing so with ease to protect the one-goal lead.
The junior only had to make two more saves throughout the rest of the game, as he and the team inched toward a shutout.
“I was feeling prepared,” Clavier said. “I just had to go out there and execute. This is our field. We train on it every day, so I knew that we had it.”
After Saturday’s effort, the Terriers have now recorded more shots in each of their last four games than in the first two combined. That hasn’t meant uniform results, as one of the four games was a loss — but against Navy, these numbers translated to a largely confident and fluid team performance.
“[In the] first half, we maintained possession. We found ourselves in good spots and pinned them in to go into halftime up one nil,” Nylen said. “You think that things can continue to move forward [in the second half], but [we] went too high at times, and so [Navy] created problems, but we found three points, and I thought there was good energy from the guys overall today.”
With as many wins as it had after 18 games in 2024, BU has good momentum going into an intense local rivalry.
The Terriers travel to Newton to take on Boston College on Tuesday — their next chance to snap a winless streak that hasn’t seen victory for the Terriers since 2012.