Now losers of two in a row and winless in three straight, the Wildcats fell 3-1 at Davenport and 3-0 at Saginaw Valley State downstate over the weekend.

NMU slipped to 4-4-4 overall and 3-4-1 in the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference. Northern is still in fourth place in the seven-team league with 10 points, but is further behind the teams in front of them — third-place Wisconsin-Parkside is more than a win ahead with 14 points, while first-place Roosevelt and second-place Saginaw Valley have at least 18 points.

The Wildcats have a pair of games in the next week, traveling to Parkside for an important game for conference position at 1 p.m. EDT Wednesday, then coming home to face St. Cloud State at the NMU Soccer Field at noon Sunday.

Here are details from last weekend:

Northern Michigan University’s Luca Rosen, right, tries to get a shot by Saginaw Valley State’s Nick Kay, left, but the Cardinals’ goalkeeper is able to keep it out during their GLIAC men’s soccer game played at the NMU Soccer Field in Marquette on Oct. 10. (Photo courtesy Cara Kamps)

Davenport 3, NMU 1

On Friday afternoon at Grand Rapids, Davenport got its first GLIAC victory of the season at Northern’s expense despite the Wildcats holding a 19-15 advantage in overall shots even as the Panthers had a 9-8 edge in shots on goal.

Northern also had seven of the game’s 11 corner kicks as fouls were even 11-11 and DU was shown three of the game’s four yellow cards.

The game was all but decided in the first half, with Davenport scoring goals in the seventh, 30th and 42nd minutes without an NMU response.

The Wildcats got their lone goal with a shade over nine minutes remaining.

DU’s opening goal came off a free kick opportunity just outside the left corner of the box as Charlie Davis fired in a shot into the right side of the net and past Northern goalkeeper Asaf Kristal, who finished with six saves. His Panthers counterpart, Beau Hudd, had seven stops.

NMU managed to put together a number of shots after that, and had a corner kick in the 21st minute that resulted in multiple shots that were all fended off.

Recent GLIAC Offensive Player of the Week Luca Rosen had several chances to get Northern on the board but was stopped both times.

Then just before the game was a half-hour old, Davis scored again, this time after the Wildcats coughed up the ball inside their own box. The Panthers’ Easton Lopez passed the ball to Davis, who fired in the goal-scoring shot.

After that, DU had three straight corner kicks, and while none of those paid off, a late drive into NMU territory did as Dugan Black slotted the ball in low to make it 3-0.

Northern upped its aggression in the second half, getting a good chance in the 68th minute. Then in the 81st minute, the Wildcats’ Max Rebori took a long pass from near midfield and relayed it to Triston Nelson for his first goal this season.

SVSU 3, NMU 0

On Sunday morning at University Center, the Cardinals got their retribution for Northern’s 1-0 win in Marquette just two weeks ago when SVSU was nationally ranked.

On a rainy afternoon, the Cards dominated up one side and down the other, holding advantages of 24-4 in all shots and 12-0 in shots on goal, taking five of the game’s seven corner kicks, too.

Kristal stood tall in the NMU goal, making eight saves as the score was still just 1-0 up until the 85th minute.

Saginaw’s only goal before that came in the 35th minute by Evan Baker, who headed in the ball after a crossing pass from teammate Liam Zimmerman.

The Cardinals thought they had the first goal much earlier than that, but one of Kristal’s teammates stopped the ball from crossing the line to mute a premature celebration from the home crowd.

While SVSU continued to apply pressure even after scoring, Kristal and the NMU defense continued to swat those tries away.

Northern also had a good scoring chance as the first half was winding down, but a Wildcat counterattack of a crossing pass was scooped away by Saginaw netminder Nick Kay.

The Cardinals got their insurance goals from Narcis Gavalda with 5:44 left after teammate Matty Telfer centered the ball for him, and with 2:05 to go on a quick counterattack that netted Gabe Olla a score.

Rosen finished with two of NMU’s four shots.

Story contents based on Northern Michigan University Sports Information press releases reviewing the games. Journal Sports Editor Steve Brownlee’s email address is sbrownlee@miningjournal.net.