Penn women's soccer looking to 'take control'

With a two-game losing streak and only one Ivy win so far this season, Penn women’s soccer is looking back and seeing how it can improve.

After losing consecutive matches to Dartmouth and Navy and dropping back to .500, the Red and Blue (5-5-2, 1-3 Ivy) will head out to New Haven this Saturday to try to bring home a victory against Yale. With inconsistency still holding the team back, however, it is going to be a fight.

Having won its last game against Cornell, Yale (6-4-2, 1-1-2) is sure to come into the match with high intensity and confidence, something that the Quakers may need to emulate.

“Every Ivy League game is important,” sophomore midfielder Lindsey Sawczuk commented. “It’s always really competitive, high-paced, so we just have to bring everything we have to every game.”

As seen in its game against Dartmouth, there is one big thing holding the team back: consistency.

“We went and we watched a video of Dartmouth,” senior midfielder Kaitlyn Moore said. “And [we] realized that there are a lot things that we did good in the game, and it’s just about consistency.”

The team has attempted to remedy this problem by focusing on repetition in its practices.

“Hopefully we will get on top of making sure we’re doing everything consistently throughout the game instead of doing really well, then kind of dropping off,” Moore said. “Because we’ve had really good ideas and executions, but we just need to make sure to keep on going.”

The team has been working on executing and attacking the net, and even though the Quakers have improved in these areas on the practice field, they are struggling to do the same in games.

“Some girls are great in practice,” coach Darren Ambrose said. “And then they get in the game and they struggle to live up to that intensity, and they can’t quite handle the expectation.”

However, the team is growing a sense of determination as they get accustomed to the higher level of play.

“For the first time this season, I’m finally listening and hearing players get upset with each other,” Ambrose said. “There’s finally a little bit of ‘we can’t let this go on much longer’ kind of attitude. We need to take control of this. I think they’re finally starting to, though it’s taking a long time.”

Penn has not lost to the Bulldogs in the last four years of Ivy play, but as its record shows, Penn has struggled in conference games thus far this year.

So will the Red and Blue get it together in time for their game against Yale? Ambrose seems to think so.

“I think we’re finally starting to let go of some of this tension, some of this anxiety that we’ve had and this inexperience,” he said.

“We just have to get repetitions in and practice the runs that we could be making,” Moore added. “Then we’ll be ready for the game and be ready to execute.”

Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The Daily Pennsylvanian.