I'm not sure fate could have drawn up a more painful way to end a season. A truly brutal end for this historically bad A&M team tonight. Literally a perfect storm to keep us out of the SEC tournament. A&M can't finish chances in front of goal all night (except for the last one which a referee mistake cost us) and lose to a terrible Missouri team, and then LSU upsets Arkansas 3-2 in a crazy match that the Hogs dominated and missed several point blank shots inside the 6 yard box in the second half when all we needed was a tie to make it in. And somehow a truly awful 4-11 Florida team squeaks in past us with our loss as well. It's just hard to wrap your mind around the fact that A&M lost to 2 of the 3 worst teams in the SEC inside a of a week. A monumental collapse.

Of course, A&M's streak of consecutive NCAA tournament appearances was snapped, but to add insult to injury, we clinched our first losing season in school history with an abysmal 7-9-2 record. There is simply no person on earth that could have foreseen such a disastrous season. Despite some bad luck with injuries and illness, this season has been a complete failure from top to bottom, from both the players on the field and a coaching staff that badly misjudged the chemistry of this team with a freshmen group that wasn't ready for this level of play when making the non-conference schedule. It's amazing to think that A&M was the pre-season favorite to win the SEC this season. I'm not sure I remember a bigger disappointment from an A&M sports team based on pre-season expectations, especially with a solid nucleus of returning players that had just reached the Elite 8 months before.

Now, to be fair, tonight's inexplicable decision by a referee cost A&M at least a tie and a chance to continue its season for another week. The ref correctly called a clear foul and red card on the Mizzou GK when Hayes was running into the box as she was headed to an easy tap in goal. The problem is the the continuation of the play (just 2 seconds later) resulted in Geczik following up on the ball and scoring, a clear goal that should have stood. Unfortunately, the ref blew his whistle and according to the rules stopped play at that point instead of playing on, which any ref with a clue would have allowed to happen. Instead, not only did A&M not get the goal, but the foul questionably happened just outside the box, so only a free kick was awarded. For some reason Olivieri decided to lob a pass to the back post where Britton made a poor attempt on it and pushed it well wide of the goal. She has to go for goal there with a minute to play, especially with her recent accuracy to the upper 90. The missed call by the referee is magnified because it happened with under 2 minutes to play and clearly ended A&M's season. At the very least this ref should be banned from calling anymore A&M games in the future and a formal complaint to the SEC office should be made. Just outrageous to miss that call in the last game of the regular season.

A&M missed about 4-5 chances in front of goal. Hayes, despite a valiant effort all night, missed a point blank easy put away in front of goal in the first half by pushing it wide of goal as the GK came out in desperation. How many crosses into the box from corner kicks did we not even touch the ball? And despite the missed call at the end, Macy Matula had the ball drop to her feet on a frantic last second corner kick that she somehow pushed wide of the goal from 3 yards out. Yes, the conditions were miserable with freezing rain and a soggy field, but the Aggies had at least 80% of the possession with nothing to show for it. This game kind of reminded me of the loss to Minnesota in the snow back in 2010 to end that season.

So a lot to think about in the offseason for the coaches and players to make 2022 a comeback season. They cannot allow this season to carryover into next year and continue a decline in the program. Remember that before last year's weird season, A&M had become somewhat underachieving and a second round exit type of program, and now we have a losing season. It does make you not take for granted all the winning we've had over the years and the consistent NCAA appearances. It's just going to be strange watching the NCAAs without A&M in it considering we had never failed to advance to the second round.

Gap said:

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MarcAg said:

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Gap said:

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MarcAg said:

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I don't understand why we wait until under 9 minutes to bring in Pante for first time or the half.

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She is usually somewhat invisible on the field. What has she done to make the lack of playing time a surprise?

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You watching the games? She is always setting up our goals.

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Season ticket holder. How about you? I missed one game this year.

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And you question why people would want Mia Pante in the game during a time when we need a goal. You question why people would want the team assist leader in the game when the season is on the line? Very strange comments coming from a season ticket holder.

Making connections in the final third and finishing were issues for us all season, this game was no different.

A truely bad season that was expected after our poor play to start the year. What was unexpected was how bad we played after we got everyone back. I really expected them gel and to start playing better but it felt like our play declined despite the fact that we ended the season playing several weak teams.

greg.w.h said:

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Soccer is a physical, contact sport. It doesn't play well with intent to injure contact or no contact even if women are playing it. You essentially have to let them past you and just stop passes.

I have been impressed over the years with our team clearly adopting a special variant of that kind of physicality: one that emphasizes quickness which is ALSO an element of physicality.

My two concerns for this year were a lack of quickness and frankly difficult to watch passing accuracy. I personally believe that is a chemistry issue and hope as things move closer to normal it works out.

I appreciate the hard work by the coaches and the players. I have zero desire to suggest they didn't work very hard. But now they can see why in and of itself hard work is merely the down payment on excellence. You have to want it every second of every day and set your own trajectory to achieve it.

Use EVERY resource. Get private coaching. Be aggressive. Take martial arts to learn how to use your body for leverage. Get outside your comfort zone and choose to make it YOUR MISSION to get better.

We will be here next year pulling for you!! You're OUR team!

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This was our worst midfield in a long time.

I don't understand the Mia Pante argument. No she wasn't playing well at the end of the season, however, very few of her teammates were either. Her playing time declined because of other aspects of the game besides assists, like positioning and inability to keep the ball without turning it over. Also, it was completely unfair of fans (me) and even Coach G (who called her "phenomenal" before the season) to put such unrealistic expectations on her. I still think she can be a very good player for us with more development and experience, and possibly a move back to her more natural position at outside back.

I'll have a more detailed season review in the coming week, addressing where things need to change and prospects for next season.

TRM said:

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This was our worst midfield in a long time.

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Yes, this is #1 reason this team was poor this year. Midfield was a total mess all season.

AgsSoccerFan said:

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Midfield certainly didn't have any continuity or consistency (or defense or forwards), but it's hard to be in a midfield watching the ball launched back & forth over your head constantly.

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Well, there was a reason the midfield was being bypassed. They couldn't complete more than 2 passes without turning it over and putting the defense on its heels.

As the post-season starts today I keep wondering what changed on the team since they played North Carolina on May 9 in the Elite 8. It's up to the players and coaches, with our support, to figure this out.
I was especially happy to see Katie Smith make SEC Second Team along with Barbara Olivieri, and Maile Hayes and Mia Pante made the Freshman Team.
I guess the next event is a week from Wednesday when players sign their Letters of Intent. I believe 5 are in this class and G said at the Aggie Soccer Hour a few weeks ago that all are expected to enroll in January so they should be playing in some exhibitions in the spring. HiddenAg has a separate thread on the Soccer Forum about Recruiting.

mullokmotx said:

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As the post-season starts today I keep wondering what changed on the team since they played North Carolina on May 9 in the Elite 8.

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Looking back now, Taylor Ziemer was a huge loss to this midfield as she solidified the defensive mid position and was the anchor for the group. We didn't have that this season.