Coach McNeil Today

[richthedentist]

For anyone who thinks that we didn't play a terrific game--TCU had a girl who scored 18 goals this year & one who had 9 & and another who had 8 & we kept them all off the scoresheet. The other girl who came in with 8 scored for them. They were a high powered offensive team. Congrats Ladies! GO RU!

Dad going to have to disagree with you there was something definitely off and I do believe some of the girls were sick there is no way he would have played the last 12 minutes of the first half with Frankie, Riley, Amirah and Sarah all off the field;
I am not saying they weren't a terrific team but we were definitely off from our passing to our lack of energy; We were lucky to get out of there with a win thanks to an unbelievable save by Gabby!!
They controlled the game and probably had a 3/1 time of possession advantage so no we didn't play terrific we played a defensive game that now I believe was because of the circumstances and thank god we got out of there with a win;
Lets hope the girls get better and we can play our game Friday and get on to the College Cup

 

[richthedentist]

This. As I stated earlier spacing was NOT very good yesterday. The lack of good angles once we crossed midfield was very noticeable.

One of the problems of the lack of good angles was because we had no one up on the attack so our options were limited as with most of the girls back we as you previously stated our spacing was terrible; we could not even reverse the field

 

[fg7321]

One of the problems of the lack of good angles was because we had no one up on the attack so our options were limited as with most of the girls back we as you previously stated our spacing was terrible; we could not even reverse the field

One of the things that TCU did extremely well was changing the field from one side to other to push the attack up the wing that was open. # 21 made a number of runs down her side but our left back shut her down every time.

the one time she took the ball inside she was untouched and she scored.

 

[RUtrumpet92_rivals498139]

Coaches poll on ncaa.com has the remaining eight teams as follows:

#1 Florida State vs. #9 Michigan
#5 Rutgers vs #7 Arkansas

#4 Duke vs #12 Santa Clara
#13 BYU vs. unranked (would be #36) South Carolina

TCU was #8, as mentioned above. We would have been howling if we were ranked 8th but given a 4 seed.

Meanwhile, #2 Virginia fell to BYU last round.
#3 UCLA lost their opener to UC Irvine.
#6 Tennessee lost to Michigan last round.
#10 UNC lost their opener to South Carolina. (Seeded 2nd, where TCU maybe belonged.)

According to the poll, the bracket on our side was stronger with 1, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. The other side had 2, 3, 4, and 10.

 

[eso1989]

Coaches poll on ncaa.com has the remaining eight teams as follows:

#1 Florida State vs. #9 Michigan
#5 Rutgers vs #7 Arkansas

#4 Duke vs #12 Santa Clara
#13 BYU vs. unranked (would be #36) South Carolina

TCU was #8, as mentioned above. We would have been howling if we were ranked 8th but given a 4 seed.

Meanwhile, #2 Virginia fell to BYU last round.
#3 UCLA lost their opener to UC Irvine.
#6 Tennessee lost to Michigan last round.
#10 UNC lost their opener to South Carolina. (Seeded 2nd, where TCU maybe belonged.)

According to the poll, the bracket on our side was stronger with 1, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9. The other side had 2, 3, 4, and 10.

Good analysis! RU is the lowest #1 seed so if they make it to the college cup, a very impressive accomplishment for a special team.

Santa Clara is the defending champ and will be tough if they make it to the college cup on their ‘home‘ field. Odd that UNC was seeded 2 when they finished 5th or 6th in the ACC and bowed out early in their tourney, yet TCU won the BIG12 title/tourney and hadn’t lost since Sept.

 

[rudad02]

Dad going to have to disagree with you there was something definitely off and I do believe some of the girls were sick there is no way he would have played the last 12 minutes of the first half with Frankie, Riley, Amirah and Sarah all off the field;
I am not saying they weren't a terrific team but we were definitely off from our passing to our lack of energy; We were lucky to get out of there with a win thanks to an unbelievable save by Gabby!!
They controlled the game and probably had a 3/1 time of possession advantage so no we didn't play terrific we played a defensive game that now I believe was because of the circumstances and thank god we got out of there with a win;
Lets hope the girls get better and we can play our game Friday and get on to the College Cup

Dentist a great defensive game can certainly be a terrific game. As I noted we shut down TCU's prolific scorer & their other top scorers. We scored & our Goalie turned in probably the best game of her career here at RU. The team showed tremendous grit & heart & we won in a pressure packed shootout when Allison Lowrey buried a laser to the bottom left corner. All this with Frankie T our top scorer & excellent playmaker clearly sub, sub par which contributed greatly to our problems in the mid field.

As an addendum, when Lowrey stepped up for her shot I had a very good feeling & told her so after the game. She responded to me, & as she stated in a subsequent video, that she smiled after Meg made the last save & she stepped up. She is a money player with a hell of a foot.

 

[Degaz-RU]

Dentist a great defensive game can certainly be a terrific game. As I noted we shut down TCU's prolific scorer & their other top scorers. We scored & our Goalie turned in probably the best game of her career here at RU. The team showed tremendous grit & heart & we won in a pressure packed shootout when Allison Lowrey buried a laser to the bottom left corner. All this with Frankie T our top scorer & excellent playmaker clearly sub, sub par which contributed greatly to our problems in the mid field.

As an addendum, when Lowrey stepped up for her shot I had a very good feeling & told her so after the game. She responded to me, & as she stated in a subsequent video, that she smiled after Meg made the last save & she stepped up. She is a money player with a hell of a foot.

Yeah Lowrey is fearless, just has "stones". She might not be the magician Ali can be dribbling, but she goes balls to the wall whenever she's out there and has a rocket for a leg. It'll be interesting to see how the attack shapes up next year without Ali and Frankie.

But, first, we need to win the natty this year!!

 

[Jules99b]

So here are the analytics of the game. Really interesting to look through but I'm not sure how much to take from it. Rutgers bunkered up after scoring the first goal and TCU is a possession based team so the stats are all skewed toward TCU being very dominant. But it's also because Rutgers allowed them to be.

 

[rudad02]

So here are the analytics of the game. Really interesting to look through but I'm not sure how much to take from it. Rutgers bunkered up after scoring the first goal and TCU is a possession based team so the stats are all skewed toward TCU being very dominant. But it's also because Rutgers allowed them to be.

Interesting also that they outshot us 22-13, but we shot 8 on target to their 7.

 

[Skull83]

Interesting also that they outshot us 22-13, but we shot 8 on target to their 7.

TCU with 31 entrances to the opponent's box to only 8 for RU, TCU with 84 entrances on final third of opponent's half to only 35 for RU, RU with only 72% accuracy on its passes - you can see why the commentator felt it was a rough exit for TCU, but exit they did. RU was living on the edge in that one.

Arkansas is going to be another very tough opponent, I don't know much about them, but they did win the SEC regular season title before losing in the conference final (sound familiar?) and they beat perennial power Notre Dame in the Sweet Sixteen. Hopefully we can reduce our stress level by having a little more possession I see Friday is a BLACKOUT at Yurcak. Go RU!

 

[rudad02]

Not sure about their 7 on target. May have been 9 with one goal included.

 

[AreYouNUTS]

TCU with 31 entrances to the opponent's box to only 8 for RU, TCU with 84 entrances on final third of opponent's half to only 35 for RU, RU with only 72% accuracy on its passes - you can see why the commentator felt it was a rough exit for TCU, but exit they did. RU was living on the edge in that one.

Excellent post. They dominated play ON the ball. No question. Thank God for solid D and GK'ing in the box area and PK's!!! Woooo!

 

[richthedentist]

Dentist a great defensive game can certainly be a terrific game. As I noted we shut down TCU's prolific scorer & their other top scorers. We scored & our Goalie turned in probably the best game of her career here at RU. The team showed tremendous grit & heart & we won in a pressure packed shootout when Allison Lowrey buried a laser to the bottom left corner. All this with Frankie T our top scorer & excellent playmaker clearly sub, sub par which contributed greatly to our problems in the mid field.

As an addendum, when Lowrey stepped up for her shot I had a very good feeling & told her so after the game. She responded to me, & as she stated in a subsequent video, that she smiled after Meg made the last save & she stepped up. She is a money player with a hell of a foot.

Definitely not arguing but as was discussed I do think some of the girls definitely were under the weather.
Going forward we are definitely going to have be more offensive and control the time of possession which includes making better passes but by being more offensive giving your girls more options and the other issue about not playing more forwards is your girls have to make long runs to be involved in the play.
100% agree on Allison would love to see her start upfront!!

 

[richthedentist]

Excellent post. They dominated play ON the ball. No question. Thank God for solid D and GK'ing in the box area and PK's!!! Woooo!

Don’t forget Gabby’s save!!!

 

[mildone_rivals]

TCU is a very good, very disciplined and skilled team that is clearly well coached. And they executed a very good game. It wouldn’t have been a poor reflection on RU, either the players or coaches, to have lost that game. It’s great that we managed to grind out a win.

There may be other reasons RU looked off in that game (e.g. flu). But TCU’s quality was a big reason we looked off, at times.

Looking forward to the game tonight.