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WSoc: Stanford 5 CSU Fullerton 2 - Printable Version

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WSoc: Stanford 5 CSU Fullerton 2 - Viking_Guy - 11-14-2014

Good god.

Let me put it this way - at halftime, visions of a nightmare from 1998 were running through my head.

A horrific first half by Stanford's midfield, a whistle that was really questionable, and the Cardinal were behind 2-0.

Let's not sell Fullerton too short.  The Titans hadn't lost since September, had won their conference tourney to earn the automatic bid, and had nothing to lose. They came out MUCH harder than Stanford, in a 4-2-3-1 that didn't let the Cardinal play endlessly with the ball through the back.  Early on, they had 4 quality shots.  And all of them were mostly the result of the extra players they had in the midfield, but also a consequence of Stanford's midfield deciding they really didn't need to track back on defense.

The questionable whistle: 8:30 in, a Fullerton player is running away from Stanford's goalmouth horizontally across the top of the 18 yard box.  Alex Doll, one of the primary offenders all game, came in to defend her, and the Fullerton player collapsed to the ground.  Now, the stream quality was bloody awful, so I hope someone at the game can chime in, but the referee immediately pointed to the penalty spot.  On a non-dangerous ball, possibly a tiny bit of contact.  And Stanford was immediately behind 1-0.  And the thing was, the only reason that player was in a dangerous position was that Stanford's midfield had let her get in behind them and in front of the two center backs on a slow developing play.

Okay, so you don't want to give up an early goal to an underdog.  Check.

Stanford upped the pressure a bit, but still looked sluggish and uninspired.  The thing with a 4-2-3-1 is that it baits the Cardinal, in their 4-3-3, to try to move the ball to the outside.  Stanford would do that, and get to midfield through the outside backs.  Then the 1 forward would rotate over, all five mids would shift to that side, and the Cardinal would immediately turn the ball around and try to go back through the back line, and to the other side, but never rapidly enough to catch the Titans out and keep them from resetting themselves.

This isn't to say that the Cardinal didn't generate chances.  But Fullerton was sagging so many people into the box, there was little room to get a shot off, and one thing Stanford doesn't do, to my consternation, is try to dribble at weaker defenders in the box.  If they are cut off, they look backwards and around to try to lay the ball off, rather than take on their player and force them to defend the ball hard.

The best shot of this timeframe was from Chi, who took a ball well outside the top of the box to her left and fired a low sizzler to the right corner of the frame which was barely parried away by the Titan keeper Stuart.

Then came the next brainlock, this time by Lo LaBonta.  Stanford was in their own box, under pressure for the first time in about 20 minutes - after the PK and a quick rush following it, Fullerton hadn't sent in any kind of shot for nearly 20 minutes.  But the Cardinal, trying to clear the ball out of their area, sent it to LaBonta facing her own goal about 6 yards outside the top of the area on the right side.

There's no better way to describe this.  She passed the ball DIRECTLY to the Fullerton forward standing just inside the area and directly between LaBonta and the goal.  Not a missed touch, and it didn't look like much of a slip.  She just hit a nice soft rolling ball directly to Christen Burkenroad, the Titans' second leading scorer.  In her own penalty area.  Burkenroad turned, took two touches to push the ball past a desperately trying to cover Romine, and buried a shot in the top of the net from about 5 yards off the endline on the right post.  Being outshot at that point something like 11-5, and ahead 2-0.  Because of two ghastly mistakes by Stanford's midfield.

Ratcliffe yanked Liedle (who I think had been caught upfield several times), Megan Turner and Alex Doll from the game, replacing them with Amack, Lee and Rosen.

And Fullerton sagged back even further onto defense. 

Stanford took advantage, peppering Stuart with long shots and trying to take advantage of her weak hands; she often punched the ball rather than trying to catch it, even on relatively innocuous shots at about chest height.  She spilled several rebounds, but the Cardinal hadn't pushed enough people forward to pounce on any of them.

2-0 Titans at halftime.  This is about when I started having nightmares about Allison Feaster et al.  A #16 seed leading a #1 seed, and playing a game that almost uniquely lends itself to a bunker defense.

(continued)

Re: WSoc: Stanford 5 CSU Fullerton 2 - Viking_Guy - 11-14-2014

Start of the second half, and Stanford playing with a bit more energy - but the Titans now only had to survive 45 minutes.  They began to play even more defensively, sending long ball clears down the sideline and to the corners at almost every opportunity, even at one point dragging the ball into their own defensive corner and trying to milk the clock - with almost 43 minutes left.

They also upped the physicality.  A long ball over the top was popped on by Uhl, who then got sandwiched by two Titans to prevent her from running onto the ball in the Fullerton penalty area.  No whistle.  A fairly obvious handball in the penalty area.  No whistle.  Finally, LaBonta got a ball at the top of the box on the right side (right at the arc) and got hacked from behind.  And the ref signalled it was outside the area, almost literally on the 18-yard line. 29 minutes left.

Turning point of the game.  Ubogagu steps up and drills a left-footed shot over/around the 5 person wall in front of her and into the right side of the goal.  I don't think Stuart ever really moved. 2-1.

Fullerton subbed, and Stanford put Turner back in for Mariah Lee, who hadn't really shown much gusto - at one point in the second half before the goal, she had been put through on the right side of the field with only one defender between her and the goal, and instead of using her speed to try to get by her or draw a foul in the area, Lee crossed the ball harmlessly into the area where all of the defenders were recovering.

And Stanford cranked up the pressure.  Another foul on the left side of the top of the box, as Uhl tried to split two defenders and run onto a bouncing ball and was dragged down, drawing a yellow card on the defense.  This time LaBonta cracked it high.

Then Uhl got on the end of a wonderful Ubogagu cross from the left and hammered it home with her head - only to be whistled for offside on a VERY close call.

All of this in about 4 minutes.  Liedle reentered for Amack, and Stanford earned a corner kick, playing around with the ball against an increasingly retreating Titan defense.  Chi again took advantage, receiving the ball being dropped back to her from the endline right at about the penalty spot, then dancing across the face of the goal and getting the ball on her left foot just to one side of a Titan defender before ripping it back into the right side netting for the tying goal. 2-2, 24 minutes left.

And Stanford kept pressing.  With a lot of traffic in the penalty area, Doll bounced a ball back to Uhl, who hammered a volley into the back of the net.  3-2.  A few minutes later, the same play, and the same result - Doll attacking, winning a ball in the box and having it fall to Taylor, volley, bam.  4-2.  And finally, as time ran down, Lo LaBonta got free on the left and chipped a ball over a defender to Chi standing alone about 10 yards out directly in front of goal.  Ubogagu crouched down and flicked a beautiful arching header over the goalie's head and settling it into the back of the net.  5-2, and Stanford saw out the last few minutes of the game, with Uhl very nearly scoring again.



For 45 minutes, Stanford was outhustled, outworked, and out-toughed by a game Titan squad.  Instead of sagging back and trying to play counter-attack as most underdogs do, they looked at Stanford's proclivity for slow build-up play out of the back line and pushed forward, disrupting the Cardinal offense and generating the chances that, with the help of some truly abysmal midfield play, gave them an astonishing lead.  Stanford outshot them, but they didn't outplay them.

Then Fullerton decided to try to see the game out.  While I was still mortified, when the Titans began to try to play delaying games only a couple of minutes into the second half, I started to feel a little better.  When they easily conceded possession by hoofing the ball down the field, and then not chasing forward with the 3-1 of their 4-2-3-1, but instead started sagging, you watched the "possession line" - where a Stanford player moving forward would be met by a defender - move steadily closer and closer to the Titan's penalty area.

Game ball to Chi Ubogagu.  No one else seemed able to shoot effectively, or willing to take on a defender, whereas Chi was often trying to play through three people marking her.  And both her freekick and the tying goal were gorgeous.  Some good work from Taylor Uhl and Hannah Farr.  But Doll and LaBonta REALLY need to take a look at what they were doing at the start.  And never do it again.

Stanford will take on Arkansas, which upset Oklahoma, in the second round next weekend, in a pod at Cagan with the other side being Washington (1-0 winners over Rider) and the winner of Missouri and Kansas, playing tomorrow in Lawrence.

Phew.

VG


Re: WSoc: Stanford 5 CSU Fullerton 2 - Canalejas - 11-15-2014

Thank you for the write-up, VG.  I was checking the score every few minutes during dinner wondering what the heck was going on.

Re: WSoc: Stanford 5 CSU Fullerton 2 - oldalum - 11-15-2014

On the PK foul, it looked to me as you describe, the ball going horizontally toward the side of the field, and our player just accidentally ran over the forward from behind. Didn't look like a flop. I thought it was a foul, and it was clearly in the box, but it did not deny the player a goal-scoring opportunity. So is the rule that any foul in the box, no matter how innocuous, results in a penalty kick? Maybe best for the ref to just play on, but would have resulted in a loss of possession by Fullerton.