10-27-2017, 06:56 PM
A couple more thoughts:
This is what Stanford and Ratcliffe are - they are extremely skilled, move the ball well, and work hard. But they tend to be undersized, and can fall victim to teams that have the horses to simply run at them and beat them physically ($C, Florida), or are content to bunker and good enough to make it work (Santa Clara last year). Last night, UCLA dominated the midfield for large portions of the game, with Stanford limited to the 10 yards nearest the touchlines, or long balls over the top. So I'm really interested in seeing what McAlpine has in store. And we shouldn't forget, they're the defending NCAA champs as well.
That said, I was hoping for a bit more from Macario last night, but UCLA did something smart - they bracketed her, and left single coverage on Carusa and Xiao. Carusa had a wide-open run from a Macario feed in the first half, one on one vs. the keeper from a narrow but very makeable angle, and sent it wide across the face of goal. The Bruins were content to keep Stanford out of the center channel and force them outside the posts, and the Cardinal didn't react well to the narrow angles. As it was, the UCLA pressure led to a lot of "back to goal" play from Macario and Haley, just trying to knock down and hold up the ball to relieve some of the pressure on the Stanford backline. For the most part, it worked, but it kept the Cardinal from applying consistent pressure, especially in the last 15 minutes. There were a whole lot of 2-3 Stanford players against 6 defenders sequences.
VG
This is what Stanford and Ratcliffe are - they are extremely skilled, move the ball well, and work hard. But they tend to be undersized, and can fall victim to teams that have the horses to simply run at them and beat them physically ($C, Florida), or are content to bunker and good enough to make it work (Santa Clara last year). Last night, UCLA dominated the midfield for large portions of the game, with Stanford limited to the 10 yards nearest the touchlines, or long balls over the top. So I'm really interested in seeing what McAlpine has in store. And we shouldn't forget, they're the defending NCAA champs as well.
That said, I was hoping for a bit more from Macario last night, but UCLA did something smart - they bracketed her, and left single coverage on Carusa and Xiao. Carusa had a wide-open run from a Macario feed in the first half, one on one vs. the keeper from a narrow but very makeable angle, and sent it wide across the face of goal. The Bruins were content to keep Stanford out of the center channel and force them outside the posts, and the Cardinal didn't react well to the narrow angles. As it was, the UCLA pressure led to a lot of "back to goal" play from Macario and Haley, just trying to knock down and hold up the ball to relieve some of the pressure on the Stanford backline. For the most part, it worked, but it kept the Cardinal from applying consistent pressure, especially in the last 15 minutes. There were a whole lot of 2-3 Stanford players against 6 defenders sequences.
VG