State of the Women - Part 2

IUPUI Women's Soccer Head Coach Chris Johnson has been gracious enough to agree upon a 'State of the Women' series for Student on Sports. After this, about every three games he will provide his input on where his team is and where they need to go. Here's the second installation after the Ball State, Detroit, South Dakota, and Nebraska matches. Coach Johnson's squad is currently 1-4.

Student on Sports: Has the picture at keeper become any clearer? Just by the numbers it seems Haseley has been the best, but will you continue to rotate?  

Coach Johnson: Kristin did a very solid job for us this past weekend, but it would be premature to rule out the other two keepers at this point.  I think we have a situation where they all three have had a chance to play in games and Kristin has the lone win for us so she is at the top for now.  We expect a spirited week of practice before our games this weekend and the opportunity is still there for any of them to earn some significant minutes.    

SoS: Your offense has just 9.2 shots per match with three goals scored, where the defense has allowed 13.6 and 12 goals. How do you plan to flip that around in the coming weeks?

Coach: I think two things are going to help us in this area.  First, the freshman are starting to adapt to the speed of play and physicality of college soccer.  Their contributions are starting to pick up and everyone is becoming more familiar with one another. We will also add several upper classmen this week who have been out hurt and have just recently been released to practice and play in games.  These new players will increase the competition for playing time which will raise our level of play in practice and also in the upcoming games. 

SoS: Does playing on the road so much made training and game planning difficult? How do you and your staff adjust?

Coach: Playing on the road can be difficult especially for the new players.  Being on a bus or in an airport for long periods of time can be very draining and difficult to keep up with your studies, but I think our trips so far have gone really well and I believe the girls have done a great job of managing their time on the road and staying on top of their schoolwork.  Lisa has done a great job of planning out a lot of the details for the trips and our long trip this past weekend went very smoothly.  These trips at the beginning of the season will help prepare us for some of the long conference trips we will make in October.

SoS: Six of the next seven games are at home, is this the most important stretch for your squad? Where would you like to be after the next seven games? 

Coach: [T]he most important stretch of our season is the month of October and the conference games.  It is important for us to continue to progress as a team and build some momentum for the conference season, but in the end it is all about winning the conference.  I am hopeful that we can enter the conference season at least .500 and hopefully above that.  I think it is important for us to be consistently scoring goals over the next seven games and have a clearer picture of who is going to help us be succesful at both ends of the field.

SoS: What's the biggest obstacle facing the Lady Jaguars?

Coach: I would not say there is one big obstacle holding us back right now.  I think there are a lot of little things we could do better, and it is up to Lisa nd I as a coaching staff to correct as many of those things as possible.  We are progressing each game, but we need to see significant progress in the next few weeks for us to accomplish the goals we have set in front of ourselves. 

I would like to extend gratitude again to Coach Johnson, as well as lots of luck for him and Women's team as they take on Western Michigan this Friday at home! That game is a 7 PM game at Kuntz Stadium on 16th Street. Students get in FREE with their JagTag!