Travis

Those punts were big time. He did a great job with field position.

I thought you were about to propose we eat babies.

I am so glad the coaches went through this thread at halftime and came across my earlier post and listened to it. First, I want to thank the coaches for being open minded enough to take an outsiders opinion. Second, I want to say you’re welcome to the coaches, players, and fans. Though my contributions did give us the W tonight. I still think we need to give some of the credit share to the players and coaches too.

I thought we learned this from last week

Run the effing ball!

Wasn't that when Duffy finally was healthy?

I am quite certain success is closer to 68.4% recruiting and 31.1% coaching. and .5% sexy

I generally find out who down votes me through the tracking of IP addresses and what not. And then I kill them.

This is a fun discussion and I loved hearing your thoughts. I would first add that I don’t see us ripping the girls I see this as an attack on tactics. I feel it was made quite clear that we see our team as the best it has ever been. Any complaint regarding the girls has been in regards to strategy and that I simply don’t believe we are being put in the best position to win. I don’t think anyone is knocking on the success Hedlund has had here. But I do think he needs to tweak his style to take us to the next level. I would still say it was most definitely style that got us beat the other night instead of draw. A good possession team will beat a good long ball team most every time. And that certainly was the case again. I can’t speak to Arkansas or Baylor and frankly don’t really care about them. The only times I have seen them play is when they played us in the past and I never thought they played long ball like we do. Regarding their success, I do not know who they played and how the other team plays strategically when they played them. That all matters. Playing tough and physical has little to do with long ball (or as you like to call it- direct) or possession as I have seen both possession teams and long ball style teams to be physical and others weak. Generally, for long ball, speed matters most and a whole lot of luck with the ball bouncing their way. If they played a solid possession team, the chances are they would lose. That is how it goes at most every level of football. That is how it has gone everytime we have played in the tournament. There was nothing I saw from the aTm game that showed me they were just better athletes (except for maybe our starting forward and another mid or two was simply tiny compared to their backline). I stand by what I said. We have played better draws and ended up with the same result with lesser teams like Texas Tech and SMU in the past. We will always play good teams in the tournament, so draw doesn’t/shouldn’t matter so much to me with a team like we had this year. It isnt draw. It is style. We have to change our tactics to increase our chances of winning. If I had the time, I would actually break down game video to prove why we didn’t increase our scoring opportunities due to how we moved the ball and it had nothing to do with the other team being better athletes. There were so many things we could have done differently that would have really opened things up.

Is this a trend with SL teams? That we kinda just fizzle out at the end?

Aggies dominated because of style. Not talent. They utilized their midfield and possession the way they should. They created a bunch of scoring opportunities. Our keeper played lights out that allowed us to stay in the game. Well, that and the fact that one Aggie made a real dumb bone headed play by not being greedy enough to take the shot that is right in front of you.

This was not a talent difference. Simply watch the game. It was completely a tactic and strategy difference. It doesn’t matter who we play in the tournament, they will all be good. We have had lucky draws before against the likes of Tech and SMU and Hedlund still never delivered. Again, philosophy results have always struck its ugly head because this style will never win tourney games when you are up against a strong possession team that uses the midefilwd as it is intended. I said this about 10 years ago and I continue to be correct. I was really hoping to be wrong this year because our team is far more athletic than years past. A good midfield is like solid offensive and defensive lines... if they do well, the teams likely do well. Our philosophy doesn’t use them as we should. Just a bunch of Hail Mary’s. But what do I know? I have only played competitively most of my life while also coaching (and officiating) for about 8 years.

Sad? Sad that we are a solid mid major program that in all the years of Hedlund making us a great program, not only have we never won a tourney game, but a Hedlund team hasn’t even ever scored a single goal in a tourney game. Sounds like you don’t really understand soccer to understand what we are complaining about. We are bitching about the style in which we play. Which has been my point for years. I know soccer well enough to understand why we are what we are. It is like I am a prophet! Again, we are a top 25 team with what should be top 25 talent. I am sure there is no way the girls are happy just because they made it to OT with aTm. They expected better. And our program is better than just to be grateful we played them into extra innings. Also, we were incredibly lucky to make it to OT.

He has coached this way with intention. I was great friends with the soccer players during my undergrad from 2000-2004 and we would discuss tactics. They even agreed with me that possession and my style of play would be far superior than the long ball that Hedlund plays. But you gotta play the way the coach wants. I am honestly not sure Hedlund is capable of coaching a different style. But it is what it is.

If we are going to play this long ball.. our forward has to be better than what I saw tonight. We got nothing from our forwards. 😞

Every year I say the exact same thing... You can find my responses from years and years ago. Hedlunds style will NEVER win us a tournament game because our style will always lose to possession teams. Always. We were flat out dominated by them. I sound like a freaking broken record.

Agreed. their style of play tends to become nothing more than kickball. I believe we have the talent to actually play good soccer. It is just never has been Hedlund's style. Ever. And he teaches the girls to play as such. And you are right, we are playing hard. We truly want it.

Halftime Dominated by aTm. Aggies have created about 2 or 3 scoring opporunities during the actual field of play where we haven't had an opportunity at all. We only had one off of a set piece. We need to push our outside mids out wide and actually use them to work the sidelines up the flag. Their midfield is controlling this game and they use their outsides very well. We continue to try to punch it to our forward with no help. This is literally the easiest style to defend against. I know this is just how we play, so lets hope the ball bounces our way (literally) and we sneak through. 22 was a liability for us, in my opinion. I don't know if it was her, or the failure of the coach to give her a legitimate role but we were playing with what seemed like a man down for awhile there. Also, our forward simply needs to push their back line and not get caught chasing an advancing aggie defender. Sadly, I don't see that happening with this aTm defense.

These aggie fans are really soccer dumb.

I know i am super critical... but half the time I want to ask them, what on Earth were you thinking there?!

Nice corner play. Almost got one in. First real threat.

I am also not sure of our forward and what her role is... because half the time she isn't even trying to go for some of the long balls... which is designed to push it high for her. Also, if they are going to push her high and send te ball, she needs to freaking stay high. Just my opinion.

So far, we have had no real offensive threat. We have had a few openings where we did so poorly we shut down any possible threat. We messed it up, not them. :o\ I don't know who our number 22 is... but I am trying to figure out what her position is and what exactly she was trying to do. She was stuck in no-mans land pretty much the entire time she was out there. aTm is dominating this game with possession. They will get something through the way they are playing. All in all, this is a fast game so far. We are playing hard... I can tell we want it. Just terrible tactics and ball placement. Also, the ref is calling the game really well... despite the idiot aTm fans..

Gunslinger Grey is actually not a bad name. But, if it were up to me, I would have called it Happy-Go-Jackie

I expected anyone who we would play to be good.