11-18-2012, 04:55 PM
Again showing that Santa Clara should've been a seed, given the relative difficulty of Stanford's 2-1 victory over them on Friday night.
Denver played a passive sagging defense, seemingly content to let Stanford possess, in order to deny space for through balls to Stanford's forwards. Even down 2-0 late in the game, they seemed content to wait, rarely venturing forward either offensively or defensively. Most of their offense was 1 or 2 players forward against 4 defenders, and Garciamendez and Maddy Thompson had lots of room at the back to move the ball around. About the only worry was that one of Stanford's defenders would get a bit too ambitious and move forward a little too far, exposing the back to a counter-attack. Almost happened about midway through the first half, when Thompson got herself in trouble dribbling into 3 defenders just past the midfield line, and turned the ball over. But there was little real threat.
Stanford scored first early in the game, when Courtney Verloo got free down the left side, centering a ball that Chi Ubogagu knocked on to an open Alex Doll for an easy finish from about 12 yards out on the right post. She didn't hit it real well, but was close enough that it got under the keeper for Denver before she could get down.
Shortly after that, Thompson had her adventure. And then the game became much harder to follow, as the webcast through the Pac-12 network, which was never really very good to begin with, dropped out entirely. When it was on, you could tell the streaming rate was set very low; any action led to pixelated pictures and slow frame refreshes. Of course, that would've been better than vanishing entirely, which it did about 22 minutes into the game. Just in time to miss a couple of good Stanford chances.
Kept trying to refresh, but the stream only came up in fits and starts; the longest continuous video I got was about 15 seconds early in the second half. After following the game via Gametracker for the remainder of the first half, I decided to check whether KZSU would be broadcasting. They were, but the student announcers fell prey to what often happens - they would get too excited by what was happening on the field to accurately report it, or would get off on tangents trying to do "color" and then have to try to get back to play-by-play having lost track of the game. They did a good job, but you could tell they were inexperienced with soccer (mispronouncing Mariah Nogueira's last name throughout), and also raised on American TV broadcasts, where describing the action is often secondary, and is in any case interrupted by the frequent stoppages of football, basketball and baseball. Soccer requires a different style.
In any case, what I gleaned from this stream-of-thought was the continual laying back of the Denver defense, occasional forays and breaks against it by Verloo and Ubogagu, and some questionable officiating of the "let em play" variety that didn't endear the ref to the Cagan crowd. A yellow card late in the first half was the only serious attempt to calm down an increasingly physical and frustrated Denver defense.
The Pioneers did come out after the half, being down 1-0, and put on some early attacks, doubling their first half shot total with 2 in the opening 5 minutes. Those were the only shots they took in the second half until a meaningless ball blasted high in the last two minutes. And when they didn't generate anything, Stanford's possession game again took over.
Then came the one highlight I really wish we had video on. Lo LaBonta popped the ball back to Nina Watkins, who struck it on the full volley left-footed for a 25 yard crack into the top right corner of the goal. For those of you who saw the U.S.-Russia friendly last week, sounded like Bradley's thunderbolt in terms of quality.
And nice for two complementary players to combine; teams are going to work hard to take away Verloo and Ubogagu in the run of play, and Garciamendez and Nogueira on set pieces. Having others step up and score will be important.
And again the Pioneers refused to up the pressure. Well, they did up it in one way, fouling more frequently and more violently. But letting Stanford play with the ball at midfield is a recipe for disaster, as this old keeper can attest. It lets the attacking team pick out what run they want to hit, and gives time to measure the pass. That lack of pressure provided the finally tally of the game, as a beautiful throughball ended up at the feet of Chi, whose calm finish allowed Stanford to empty its bench in the last 12 minutes.
Next up Friday in a rematch of the best match of the year, against the Bruins at Cagan. Again, this shouldn't be happening; the Bruins could be in any other region as the 2 or 3 seed, but to stick them in Stanford's, unless there were 3 other seeded Pac-12 teams, is ludicrous.
1 of 3 big contests down. Let's go basketball!
VG
Denver played a passive sagging defense, seemingly content to let Stanford possess, in order to deny space for through balls to Stanford's forwards. Even down 2-0 late in the game, they seemed content to wait, rarely venturing forward either offensively or defensively. Most of their offense was 1 or 2 players forward against 4 defenders, and Garciamendez and Maddy Thompson had lots of room at the back to move the ball around. About the only worry was that one of Stanford's defenders would get a bit too ambitious and move forward a little too far, exposing the back to a counter-attack. Almost happened about midway through the first half, when Thompson got herself in trouble dribbling into 3 defenders just past the midfield line, and turned the ball over. But there was little real threat.
Stanford scored first early in the game, when Courtney Verloo got free down the left side, centering a ball that Chi Ubogagu knocked on to an open Alex Doll for an easy finish from about 12 yards out on the right post. She didn't hit it real well, but was close enough that it got under the keeper for Denver before she could get down.
Shortly after that, Thompson had her adventure. And then the game became much harder to follow, as the webcast through the Pac-12 network, which was never really very good to begin with, dropped out entirely. When it was on, you could tell the streaming rate was set very low; any action led to pixelated pictures and slow frame refreshes. Of course, that would've been better than vanishing entirely, which it did about 22 minutes into the game. Just in time to miss a couple of good Stanford chances.
Kept trying to refresh, but the stream only came up in fits and starts; the longest continuous video I got was about 15 seconds early in the second half. After following the game via Gametracker for the remainder of the first half, I decided to check whether KZSU would be broadcasting. They were, but the student announcers fell prey to what often happens - they would get too excited by what was happening on the field to accurately report it, or would get off on tangents trying to do "color" and then have to try to get back to play-by-play having lost track of the game. They did a good job, but you could tell they were inexperienced with soccer (mispronouncing Mariah Nogueira's last name throughout), and also raised on American TV broadcasts, where describing the action is often secondary, and is in any case interrupted by the frequent stoppages of football, basketball and baseball. Soccer requires a different style.
In any case, what I gleaned from this stream-of-thought was the continual laying back of the Denver defense, occasional forays and breaks against it by Verloo and Ubogagu, and some questionable officiating of the "let em play" variety that didn't endear the ref to the Cagan crowd. A yellow card late in the first half was the only serious attempt to calm down an increasingly physical and frustrated Denver defense.
The Pioneers did come out after the half, being down 1-0, and put on some early attacks, doubling their first half shot total with 2 in the opening 5 minutes. Those were the only shots they took in the second half until a meaningless ball blasted high in the last two minutes. And when they didn't generate anything, Stanford's possession game again took over.
Then came the one highlight I really wish we had video on. Lo LaBonta popped the ball back to Nina Watkins, who struck it on the full volley left-footed for a 25 yard crack into the top right corner of the goal. For those of you who saw the U.S.-Russia friendly last week, sounded like Bradley's thunderbolt in terms of quality.
And nice for two complementary players to combine; teams are going to work hard to take away Verloo and Ubogagu in the run of play, and Garciamendez and Nogueira on set pieces. Having others step up and score will be important.
And again the Pioneers refused to up the pressure. Well, they did up it in one way, fouling more frequently and more violently. But letting Stanford play with the ball at midfield is a recipe for disaster, as this old keeper can attest. It lets the attacking team pick out what run they want to hit, and gives time to measure the pass. That lack of pressure provided the finally tally of the game, as a beautiful throughball ended up at the feet of Chi, whose calm finish allowed Stanford to empty its bench in the last 12 minutes.
Next up Friday in a rematch of the best match of the year, against the Bruins at Cagan. Again, this shouldn't be happening; the Bruins could be in any other region as the 2 or 3 seed, but to stick them in Stanford's, unless there were 3 other seeded Pac-12 teams, is ludicrous.
1 of 3 big contests down. Let's go basketball!
VG