It was an excruciating road trip for UR women’s soccer, as the ladies were defeated by both Washington University on Friday and University of Chicago on Sunday.
In the Washington game, neither team was able to put the ball in the net during the first half. Throughout the game, the momentum from both teams was lacking, resulting in little action in the box. “Our biggest challenge was taking shots on goal,” said freshman goalkeeper Adriene Hulchanski. “We didn’t really get that many shots to challenge the keepers.”
On the other side, head coach Terry Gurnett expressed how Washington held back, especially in the first half. “They rarely got past midfield and never played dangerous,” he said.
Sophomore forward Portia Bridges noticed a decline in the level of play against Washington. “I think we just played a lower level of soccer. We were slow to the ball. We didn’t really have a strong first half and that hurt us. They just took advantage of their opportunities better than we did,” said Bridges.
In the second half, however, UR managed to score and led the game 1-0. The opponents managed to sneak in two goals at the end of the game to take the victory. “The second half, we were on our way, but unfortunately we came up a couple of goals behind,” Gurnett said.
Overall, in respect to the Washington game, the team was disappointed that domination for the majority of the game crumbled at the finale of the contest. Despite this, the team, now 11-5, remains optimistic. “We’re not giving up and we are going to keep fighting,” Gurnett said. “We are going to keep playing hard. We are trying to keep improving as a team with every game.”
UR continued its away weekend by facing Chicago, a contest that ended in a 1-0 overtime loss for the Yellowjackets. The team faced the challenge of a team that has improved over the years and a team that managed to finish off the game with a single golden goal in the first period of overtime. Despite the defeat, UR’s level of play was high and one they are proud of. “We played very well,”said Bridges. “Chicago is a lot better than they have been in past years. We battled very hard and I think we deserved to win. We outmatched them both halves and we just didn’t finish and put the ball in the goal.”
Even though the opportunities were there, the Yellowjackets were not able to topple their opponents. “We weren’t taking advantage of our opportunities,” Bridges explained. “We just weren’t putting it away, we just didn’t have the authority in the box we needed to win that game.”
Taking all this into account, the team remains optimistic. “We played really, really well,” said Hulchanski. “Terry [Gurnett] said it was the hardest team we’ve faced all season, and we did an awesome job against them. We should be proud of ourselves.” Gurnett agreed, stating “I think we played one of the best games of the year. We played hard and inspired soccer. The kids just played really hard, played well, and it was a fun game to watch because the game was end to end and good soccer was being played. It was tough to lose but we played very well, so I take a positive from that.”
Josephson can be reached at ejosephson@campustimes.org.
