But the snow that covered the NMU Soccer Field at a depth of several inches overnight stayed away during the Wildcats’ GLIAC Tournament quarterfinal game on Sunday afternoon.

Still, while the temperatures were cold enough for the white stuff, Northern stayed hot enough to prevail after 90 minutes of regulation, 20 minutes in a pair of overtime periods, and eight rounds of penalty kicks.

With a win after what was officially a 2-2 overtime tie, tournament No. 3 seed NMU advances to the conference tourney semifinals at 2 p.m. Friday to face No. 2 Roosevelt. That match and the other semifinal pitting No. 5 Davenport and No. 1 tourney seed and semifinals-finals host Saginaw Valley State goes earlier at 11 a.m. Games in that round and Sunday’s 1 p.m. championship game will be played at University Center, SVSU’s campus located between Saginaw and Bay City.

“This was the moment we have been practicing for for a year,” Northern head coach Alex Fatovic said in an NMU Sports Information news release detailing the result. “In our practice sessions in the (Superior Dome) during the wintertime, we’re not calling fouls at practice, being physically harder on ourselves, going through all the pitfalls of last season, (and when we got to penalty kicks), we just reminded them that they’ve been here before and that you’re prepared for this moment.

Northern Michigan University’s Teun van Gansewinkel is somewhere in this group of Wildcat players celebrating his goal during a GLIAC Tournament quarterfinal round game played against Purdue Northwest at the NMU Soccer Field in Marquette on Sunday. (Photo courtesy NMU)

“Overtime cramping, injuries, it didn’t matter. Our guys rose to the challenge.”

Close to sunrise on Sunday morning, around 7 a.m., the Wildcats coaching staff realized they had to shovel their “advantage” off the field if they wanted to play later that day.

Goalkeeper coach Bryce Beckley and his father started shoveling what was estimated as three inches of heavy, wet snow covering the pitch just outside of the Superior Dome and in view of Lake Superior.

By 10 a.m., NMU SI reported that about a hundred area residents with help from fellow Wildcats coaches, staff and athletes worked until about an hour before the 1:30 p.m. game start to get the field cleared.

Still, temperatures remained near 30 degrees with winds whipping the wind chill into the teens.

“This was a full community win today,” Fatovic said. “We had people out here for five-plus hours clearing the field this morning so our guys could play and have this opportunity.

“I’m so grateful for everyone who showed up (Sunday) and helped make this an amazing day for NMU Athletics as well as our program.”

With multiple feet of snow piled near the sidelines, hundreds of fans were reported in the stands blowing vuvuzelas and banging drums.

Offense was the rule in the early going, with all the pre-shootout scoring coming in the first 25 minutes.

Nevertheless, offense ruled the day, with the Wildcats holding a 27-25 advantage in total shots even as Purdue NW had a 9-8 edge in shots on goal. In addition, NMU had a slim 9-8 advantage in corner kicks as both teams were called for 11 fouls. All three of the game’s yellow cards were shown to Pride players.

Northern jumped out to a 2-0 lead before the game was 15 minutes old, starting in the ninth minute when Teun van Gansewinkel opened the scoring on a bang-bang-bang play.

Quint van Roij stopped a clearing pass by the Pride, seeded No. 6, and played the ball to teammate Alessandro Scialanga. The latter fired a left-footed cross to the back post where waiting was van Gansewinkel, according to NMU SI, who knocked it directly in.

The lead doubled less than four minutes later after the Wildcats (7-4-6) took a corner kick following a good run by James Carr. Scialanga took the corner kick in front of the NMU student section, sending the ball to the close post, where van Roij headed the ball in for his first goal of the season.

Purdue NW must’ve discovered that goals could be scored in the cold, so the Pride (3-12-3) took advantage to even the score within 13 minutes.

In the 19th minute, Miguel Rodriguez de la Garza drove to the far side box before sending a cross to Landon Potts, whose header beat the outstretched hand of NMU netminder Asaf Kristal for his sixth goal this season.

Then with 21:46 still remaining in the first half, PNW’s Rami Hassan Zantout shielded himself from a Northern defender before turning and dropping a pass to Carson Byblow, according to NMU SI. Byblow barely moved into the box and hit a screamer that beat Kristal in the upper corner.

Later in regulation, Wildcats’ leading scorer Luca Rosen had a chance to put the home team ahead again, beating the Pride back line and going one on one with PNW goalkeeper Mateus Baptista de Souza. But the keeper came out and took the angle away to help him stop the shot.

That wouldn’t be NMU’s last time getting a chance to take the lead. Another time, Rosen slid a pass to van Gansewinkel, who apparently scored as the Wildcats began to celebrate until the far-side line judge raised his flag ruling the play offside.

And not long after that scare, van Gansewinkel had a header in tight that narrowly missed the goal post.

“We dropped the ball,” Fatovic said. “We let two goals in, but we responded really well.

“We had chances right away and had opportunities to go back in goal, so I was really pleased with the resilience.” 

All this just got the game to what turned into a pair of 10-minute overtime periods.

“We got the wind in the first overtime session, and we said ‘Hey, let’s go win the game,’ and when we didn’t get it, that turned into ‘Look, we want to win, but we also don’t want to lose it, so let’s get ourselves a chance at the shootout,’ Fatovic said.

“We were getting moments and getting chances, our guys never stopped trying to get that winning goal, but we also didn’t give anything away. We were super clean in the second half of overtime, and that gave us a chance in the shootout.”

With penalty kicks now reserved almost only for playoff games, Sunday was just the second time the NMU men have been involved in this kind of shootout since the program was inaugurated in 2016.

The teams were tied 3-3 after the regulation five rounds of the penalty kicks. Jan Hoffmann, Scialanga and Rosen scored for NMU, as did Hugo Lorenzo, Nicholas Maragon and Nikola Ivetic for PNW.

Sudden death came after that, with both teams scoring the first two rounds. That was Jadon Thang for NMU and Rodriguez de la Garza for the Pride, then van Roij for Northern and Zantout for Purdue NW.

That brought the shootout to an eighth round, and after Ian Weimer scored for the Wildcats, Byblow missed high on his shot for PNW to end the game.

Weimer was the GLIAC Offensive Player of the Week just last week after he scored in each of NMU’s final two regular-season games that guaranteed Sunday’s game would be in Marquette.

“Full credit to Purdue,” Fatovic said. “They battled and pushed us all the way, but our guys showed amazing resilience, fight and spirit, and to go into the eighth round of a shootout, that takes incredible poise.

“Just an amazing game from our guys, and I believe they can do anything now.”

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