First off, we have to recognize that A&M even reaching the Elite 8 this year with a young roster and without two key seniors from the Fall is a nice accomplishment. I don't think anyone thought this was possible after that loss to Rice a month ago. I know a lot of folks will point to Sample's big mistake as the reason we lost, but I would argue Olivieri's point blank easy 1v1 miss midway through first half was really the back breaker for the momentum and mental edge in the match. A&M would have led 1-0 and it would have forced UNC to press a bit more and made them uncomfortable, which is how you beat them. Barbara has missed several of these now this season and it's something that she must work on in the offseason if she wants to take her game to the next level and help A&M back to a College Cup.
I'm going to start with the back line because that is where I think the biggest mistake this Spring was made trying to force our current roster to continue to play a 3 back set when we didn't have the level of quality needed to have that few in the back. That's a lot of pressure on Sample and Smith, and the damn finally broke in the last few matches. Colvin was out of position and Dumond was not ready for this level of play yet (although to be fair she had a few good tackles in the first half). I would have gone with 4 in the back, maybe moving a more athletic midfielder there if we didn't have the quality depth needed currently at the position. This is where the loss of Lopez really hurt us because with her at left back we don't have these issues. The back pass mistake by Sample when Pounds wasn't expecting it in the middle of the field led to UNC's winning goal, however, the defense did get back to stop the initial counter until a quick pass to Norwood in the box led to a quick turn and shot low to the corner that Caldwell couldn't quite reach. You just can't give up a goal with less than 2 minutes left in a half and you could tell it deflated the team going into halftime. To be fair, it probably should have been a deserved 2-1 lead for UNC at the half when you count up all the real chances on goal. However, there were also some good stops and tackles by Sample and Smith, especially in the first half, and they held UNC to only 7 shots, so I can't say they played poorly. We were just outmanned and playing only three in the back didn't help. The good news is that we have some more options in the Fall with the newcomers available to play.
I believe this lack of confidence in the back led to much of the passing backwards and silly square balls that were easily picked off, including the game winner for UNC today. When you feel pressured and you are unsure of the best decision, you will naturally have a retreat/defensive mentality, which leads to weak passes backward and then being out of position to get back and defend your initial mistake. It just amazes me that we continued to do this today after the avalanche of mistakes against OSU just days ago. When we actually just kicked the long ball down the sideline and then chased, we had better success and even set up some offensive momentum as UNC was having to defend and we could pressure them in their own defensive third. Now normally I'm not a fan of this, but for this current team and roster it was the better option, especially against elite teams like UNC that will make you pay for those mistakes.
The forwards really struggled today. After having 38 shots against OSU, we only mustered a season low 4 today in 90 minutes. Even against a stellar UNC defense, that is just not going to get it done. Our only real offense all day was Olivieri's missed 1v1 and another wide-angled shot across the goal mouth that just missed the post. The box score says we played a 3-4-3, but at times it looked we were playing a 3-4-2-1 formation to maximize players around the ball in the midfield. That didn't give us a lot of chances to create shots before UNC took it away from us. There were times when we were trying to be too perfect in setting up shots when it would have been better to take a few more from just outside the box. Carroll had a rough game for the most part and wasn't very effective today. On a few of her breakaways in space, she decided to dribble into the middle of the field and lost the ball instead of going wide where she is more dangerous with crosses and with attacking the goal from an angle. Jai Smith came in and played well again and she had the best cross and set up of a scoring chance in the second half. On that opportunity, Geczik lost her balance on the shot which led to a weak dribbler to the GK. Instead she could have slotted a pass to her right to Carroll who was all alone for an easy tap in. I was disappointed Jai was taken out when she was playing with energy and making good decisions to go wide and play to her strengths. Russell didn't seem as active as she was against OSU.
At midfield, Olivieri has to convert that 1v1. It was a beautiful build-up with over 10 passes and then a perfectly weighted pass from Bates to Barbara, who calmly collected it and had a chance to slot it on the ground past the UNC keeper, but instead opted for an upper 90 shot in the only place where it could have been defended with a hand, which is exactly what happened. That really changed the match IMO. We seemed a bit deflated after that and never really recovered fully. Olivieri had another opportunity on a breakaway from a long ball out of the back that a UNC defender misplayed, but it was from an angle that was too tight to score from, although it was close. I thought the midfield of Bates, Pounds, Kolb, and Ziemer did a good job of pressuring UNC in the first half and made their life miserable with tip-aways and breaking their momentum. We had some good, precise touches and at times had the Tar Heels confused and backing up. They also intercepted several passes which led to chances in the offensive third. However, in the second half with the strong wind against them, they just couldn't maintain any real possession or apply enough effective pressure to make many forays into UNC territory. We were basically defending the entire half, which doesn't happen to A&M very often. Pounds in particular had a really poor half, while Kolb wasn't much of a factor either. The last 5 minutes of the match were especially frustrating as we showed some low soccer IQ by trying to play small ball in getting the ball out of corners instead of just kicking long balls and chasing by playing a high line and moving the playing area up the field.
Really the first half was pretty even with UNC having a bit more possession and chances on goal. They missed two point blank chances that should have been put away so we were lucky to still be in the game after the first 25 minutes. UNC dominated the second half with possession and frustrated A&M with the help of a strong wind, which was a major factor today. It helped us in the first half to stay even with them, then we couldn't maintain possession and go forward much against the wind in the second half. The Tar Heels kicked a lot of long balls into corners and pinned us deep, which made getting into any rhythm in the second half difficult. UNC showed their quality with their first touches throughout the match, rarely letting a ball get more than 2 feet in front of them. That's something A&M needs to improve to compete at this level. A&M also made some poor passes to the strikers when going forward in the second half instead of being more patient and going wide for crosses. A&M only had a few chances around the box in the final 30 minutes and we didn't take advantage of any of them.
Do you want to know how talented that UNC squad was today? They were so deep with talent that they continued using 6-man line changes throughout the match without missing a beat. It's also one of the reasons A&M was worn down and had tired legs late in the match. They haven't allowed a goal this Spring, which is remarkable. Pinto, Meza, Jones, and company are elite talents and they have an equally talented midfield to support the attack. And this was even after losing two of their stars to the draft (Pinto decided to play this Spring despite being drafted third overall). It's tough to see so many Texas kids on their roster. And that's really the only real difference between these programs. It starts and ends with recruiting about 80% of the time. UNC probably won this match about 2 years ago on signing day. A&M is now 1-6 in Elite 8 games with 3 of those losses to UNC. Our only victory was as a #1 seed playing at home in 2014 so it shows how important having an elite level of talent is to consistently win at this point in the tourney. Now, A&M does have talent with at least 3 five-stars on the field today and multiple 4-stars as well. The problem is that UNC has mostly 5-stars across the entire starting lineup, while Stanford and UCLA have even more talent than that if you can believe it. Remember Coach G's quote a few weeks ago about the fact that A&M couldn't even get a "sniff" from any of Stanford's current roster during recent recruiting cycles. And that's probably also true of UCLA, UNC, and Duke rosters as well (FSU recruits internationally). How big would it have been today to have Texas kids like Ordonez (a one-time A&M commit) from Virginia or Meza or Allen from UNC about now? That's why it's so important for Bjork and company to step up and give this A&M program the top-notch facility it deserves in order to better compete for the truly elite prospects, especially in our own state. Outside of a lucky break in the tourney when all the top seeds are upset, elevating recruiting to the next level is the only path to a national championship.
Finally, kudos to the A&M fans who were there today as they were vocal and louder (at least on the live stream) than the UNC fans who were basically playing a home game. Next year should be good season and it's obvious the coaching staff believes we will be very good considering the toughest slate of non-conference opponents in many years (at FSU, at Clemson, OSU, TCU). We need to adjust to and get used to playing this level of opponent earlier in the season so games like today aren't such a shock to the system. It also gives us an idea of how far we have to go to compete and win these games and also to begin making adjustments during the SEC season to prepare for the tourney. It was a strange year but overall a good one considering expectations, and next season is only 3 months away.
