W Soccer: Arkansas 1 Texas 0

[Seattle4UT]

UT drops 1-0 decision to Arkansas

Starting off with the wrong foot for new Coach Angela Kelly.

 

[Bill in Sinton]

Well they did beat Dayton in OT 3-2 on Friday night not that this beginning is anything to whop de do about.

 

[ViperHorn]

While it may not hve made much of a difference it appears Texas' best GK is in Japan. Link

 

[overseasbbfan1]

We will be without Smith, one of the nation's top recruits and arguably the best incoming goalie in the country, for the first seven contests. Or that's what I'm estimating based on the USA U-20 World Cup schedule. She should be back in time for the last couple of pre-conference matches.

An interesting start to the season, and about what might have been expected based on all of the newcomers on the squad, and attrition that occurred as a result of the coaching transition. 1-1 was a likely outcome after two matches, but with reverse results. Dayton is actually a very good team and ranked 34th, or in the AR category of the preseason poll. They've won three conseutive Atlantic 10 tourney titles and returned a lot of their top players, inc Williams who is two-time All-American and on this year's Hermann watchlist. It was a good sign that we played well and won our opener against them. On the other hand, Arkansas finished tied for last in the SEC last year, and was picked to finish 12th of 14 teams this season. So not a very good result there. But this season promises to be an up-and-down one, in particular with so many newcomers seeing significant playing time.

As far as the attrition is concerned, that's to be expected with a coaching change, but we were hit pretty heavily on that front. As far as I can tell six players decided not to return, inc many of our top performers. Gaul, Frausing-Pedersen and Harris were three of our four all-conference honorees, and Gaul and Harris were our only two members on the all-region squad. All are gone, as are Ibewuike (#3 scorer last season), Wedemeyer and Russo. Our #2 and #5 scorers from last season, Higgins (the lone Big 12 honoree from last year to return) and Cummins, are back, as is Gilbert, who was named to the all-newcomer squad in 2011. But overall we lost a lot of talent, which in the end may be a good thing because so many freshmen are going to see a lot of action this year. That bodes well in terms of building for the future, which is probably what this squad is looking towards at this point.