Marshall men's soccer: Herd learning to solve puzzles from opposing defenses

HUNTINGTON — Marshall men’s soccer coach Chris Grassie said after a 3-0 win over Charleston in its final exhibition that there’s still more to work on as the team makes a sprint to the regular season on Thursday at home against Fairfield. In the exhibition, Marshall and Charleston played a scoreless first half before the second group scored three goals in less than 15 minutes. Grassie called Charleston’s first unit the best Marshall saw in two exhibitions. Joao Alves scored on a penalty kick, Pedro Martins scored on an assist from Joshua Nugent and Ramado Pierre-Louis took a chance on his own to split the defense and score unassisted. Pierre-Louis is a freshman from Miami. “We play fast, and at the same time, we’re taking things slow and step by step,” Pierre-Louis said. “I’m going to keep trying my best for Marshall, for me and the fans.” Grassie said the biggest difference was a shift in playing to space. “Just getting some of the concepts of where the space is and how to attack it,” Grassie said. “The team took the information in the second and went on and did it. That’s a positive.” Marshall was called offside four times, a point of improvement being over-aggression to the sideline runs. “We need to exploit space better,” Grassie said. “There was one space in the first game that was open, and we didn’t exploit it well enough. Then, we worked on it in training. It was a completely different space this time. We just need to continue to solve the puzzle that is in front of us.” Grassie said a longer offseason would be ideal as a pair of exhibitions meant less experience to adjust to new tactics in each matchup. “It’s not the last puzzle we played against,” Grassie said. “That’s a mentality thing, but we’ve only had six or seven training sessions. Preseason is way too short in Division I. We need six weeks to really bring those guys to speed fitness wise. I’d love to see those changes eventually.” Fairfield finished 8-5-5, played to a 4-2 loss to eventual No. 1 seed Vermont and took a win over No. 17 Marist 5-1 in 2025. It’ll be a strong test at 7:15 p.m. to start the season Thursday before the Herd goes on a road trip to UC Santa Barbara and George Mason. “I think we’re okay to start, but it’ll be a tough test against Fairfield on Thursday,” Grassie said. “Hopefully, we’re ready for the problems they are causing. They will be different than the two problems we have already faced.”