When I saw the Stanford women's soccer team's draw going into the College Cup, I decided right then and there I was not going to make any public predictions this year.
NAU? I know, not a national powerhouse, but not a bad squad at all. But then, in the round of 32, SU got BYU, which I knew would be very, very tough. BYU has its own national cable channel, so the BYU women are on all the time. Other than not being the fastest team on the planet, they play total football and were apparently unlucky to go down 1-0 in the first minute against Stanford.
So now SU gets Santa Clara, a team that plays every bit as tough as BYU, but has more of a soccer pedigree and probably more soccer-savvy.
By a number of accounts, SU's defensive midfield troubles have continued. Sloppy, lazy passing, getting rattled and booting the ball upfield. Not going to the mattresses for the 40-60 or even 50-50 balls. THAT has GOT TO STOP. I once saw a sign in a baseball dugout (of all places) that said "Hustle Requires No Talent".
[TANGENT ALERT! TANGENT ALERT!!] OK, I brought up baseball. I can't resist going off on a tangent to give it a good slam, inasmuch as I think baseball, as far as watching it goes, has GOT TO be the most boring sport on the face of the earth, next to, say, curling and golf. Yet I suppose, even in a 19th-century, stop-motion, tag-team sport such as baseball hustle may have its utility. One final note -- I did say "boring to watch". I say in all earnestness baseball (and yes, I mean baseball, not its dumbed-down cousin softball) is fun to play. When I was 14, in a sandlot game, I struck out the neighborhood bully, with strike three being the only curve ball I have ever thrown in my life. I had no idea what I was doing, but that ball dipped down and away like nobodies business, causing Mr. Most-likely-to-join-a-motorcycle-gang to whiff by a foot or more. My older brother was the catcher, and witnessed it all. He can vouch for me if I refresh his memory aggressively enough. At that point, I had achieved more than all I had ever wanted to in baseball, so I walked off that field never to play baseball again. [End Tangent]
Anyway, in soccer, simple things like hustle aren't everything, but I would say it is 66% of everything. A great team has to fight for and win loose balls. A great team has to do things as simple as HIT THE BALL HARD when passing it. Why pass the ball slowly when you can pass it fast and crisp? Pass quickly and crisply, and the other team has to work a LOT harder marking and trying to dispossess you,and you create a LOT MORE space for yourself. Stanford D-mids, this means YOU. And, would say, Stanford needs to pressure the ball a lot better.
Perhaps it is time for the Stanford coach to settle on starting his eleven best soccer players from here on out, period. Tell them they are going to be in there unless they get hurt or gassed. Yes, it means some people are going to have to sit. But the fact of the matter is this is the "big dance" and that can only mean one thing:
You dance with the ones that brung ya.
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2 comments:
Still wading the tape of the SU-Cal game.
As far as the BYU game, my Dad and Bro said the ladies from Provo were a tough, talented bunch. Their high altitude lungs and legs proved almost too much for the Card. Both relatives said that they were the toughest team they've met all season, including UCLA.
Once the Card realized that the refs were going to let them play a physical match, they were giving as well as they got.
The mids and the defense are still having trouble, especially the mids. I must have missed something about T's(Noyola) fitness or ability to play a full 90.
Verloo seems well, I don't know. Not what I expected from such a highly regarded recruit. And using LT in the mid seems to be a waste.
What do you think?
Ali Riley, having a fantastic year, should be back next week from the twisted ankle. Maybe the defense is doing alright, it's just the competition is that good.
Santa Clara's coach has seen this new lineup a number of weeks now and must be relishing his chances.
The natives(fans) are getting restless and nervous.
Jerry,
I was not happy when I saw BYU as the 2nd round opponent. I have seen a fair number of their games this season and they are close to breaking into the ranks of the elite programs. I still felt Stanford was the better team, but I will admit I am REALLY glad the game was not played at altitude.
I feel a lot better about Stanford's backline defense than I do about the defensive midfield. The Dmids need to settle down and do some little things right. Too often they pass like U-15 girls instead of the elite, national-quality women soccer players they are. They put themselves under unnecessary pressure by all those slow, lazy, and occasionaly misdirected passes. And they needn't boot the ball to the other team just because a player with a different colored shirt comes within 5 yards of them. I still feel their problems are entirely correctable. They just need to do a few things they are entirely capable of doing. But the fact is a team like UNC will pressure each SU defensive midfielder who has the ball with 2 and 3 girls at a time. Nobody swarms better and more efficiently than UNC, and they know how to turn those situations into breakaways. Ah, well, gotta get there first.
If Ratcliffe (sp?) thinks he needs to play LT in the midfield, that can work as long as she can run out of the midfield and attack the goal at will. This means one striker needs to drop back when LT goes forward. That can work. LT does a nice job of holding the ball in traffic up high; a valued task in an attacking mid. But if she has to track way back to help the d-mids, that is a waste of her strengths.
Verloo I think is a good player. She is light-years behind where Kelley was as a freshman, but she is still a good player. But, as we saw with LT in last year's tournament, freshman are generally not going to be the big impact players for your team in the later rounds. Verloo is fine coming off the bench against tired legs, but I doubt from here she is going to be a go-to attacker. Though I would love to be proven wrong on that.
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