Baker not pleased with Penn's victory

The Quakers defeated LaSalle 4-0 yesterday, but Penn coach Patrick Baker expected more. It sounded as if everybody but the officials lost yesterday's women's soccer match between Penn and La Salle. "We had some players who just didn't come out to play today," La Salle coach Craig Dorman said. "We didn't do what we were supposed to do." "We were not focused," Penn coach Patrick Baker said. "Our group felt like 'Ho-hum. We're regionally ranked, we think we can just step out here and win.' We have not won enough games, and you can never win enough games to ever feel that way." The Quakers got off to an uncharacteristically quick start out of the gate. Co-captain Tina Cooper just missed a scoring opportunity 45 seconds into the game, but four minutes later, the midfielder put Penn on the board by netting a long pass on the fly from Andrea Callaghan. "Coach has made a point in the last couple of days to make sure that we start early and fast, so I just wanted to be on top of them the minute that we came out," Cooper said. "I'm glad that I was there with the first goal since we were against the wind in the first half." The tide would turn very quickly after Cooper's goal, as the Explorers (4-2) dominated in the Penn end of the field for several minutes. "We were dynamic in the first five minutes, and then it was like 'OK, we scored a goal, and the rest are going to come'," Baker said. The rest did not come for a while. Both squads ended up in several one-on-one battles for loose balls. Both coaches also differed on who won that aspect of the game. "We didn't challenge 50-50 balls, we didn't challenge balls in the air, we allowed Penn to play us and we never played them," Dorman said. "I think La Salle just wanted it more than we did. They pressured us a lot better than we pressured them defensively," Baker said. "They won everything, every loose ball, head ball, more 50-50 balls." The difference would be speed, as Callaghan and Cooper would switch roles on the next goal. This time, it was Callaghan who received a crossing pass from Cooper ran down the right side of the field, and put the shot into the net, giving Penn a two-goal lead in the 24th minute. The lead was not safe. La Salle attempted to break the Penn defense with turnovers in the Quakers' end. With the Explorers pressing to close the gap, Baker made more substitutions, inserting midfielders Ashley Kjar and Angela Konstantaras. "Before we went in coach said, 'Before half, I want a goal.' So we both decided to make it happen," Konstantaras said. One minute after entering the game, the midfielders put Penn up for good. After receiving a Kjar pass, Konstantaras beat one defender before firing a bullet off the hand of La Salle goalie Erin Lenox to score in the 38th minute. Forward Jill Callaghan finished the scoring in the second half on a long run up th left side, beating two defenders before scoring. La Salle only had eight shots on the afternoon to Penn's 18 shots. However, their day rode on key opportunities off Penn turnovers in the first half. La Salle never recovered from their first half misses. "We talk about that constantly, capitalizing on opportunities once we have them, not allowing things to get away from us in that situation, and that's what happened today," Dorman said. Favoring the Quakers once again was their bench, with most of the roster seeing playing time. Similar to recent opponents, the Explorers were limited in who they could put into action. "Our problem is that we have a lot of young freshman who have not played at a higher level and we need them to get to that higher level before we can actually put them in a game," Dorman said. With the 4-0 victory, Penn (6-1) won their fifth game in a row as well as their fifth shutout of the season, surpassing their win total of last season. Despite the win, the team saw their performance as lackluster. "There's no way to sugarcoat it. The first half was the worst 45 minutes we've played all year, and this was the worst game we've played all year without question," Baker said. "[Penn leading] 3-0 at halftime could've been 3-0 them if they had anybody up front that could finish." "Even though it was a big win," Konstantaris said, "We should've played as if we were playing a No. 1 team."