W. Soccer can't keep leaving it to chance

There are many theories as to why Americans don't take to soccer too well -- it's low-scoring, players don't use their hands and there are ties.

However, I think it could be the little things in a foreign sport like soccer that make it different than traditional American sports. If your football team makes it into the red zone five times, while the opponent's offense gets in there once, a win is almost always guaranteed. Your squad might turn it over once or twice, but you'll still get three or four field goals because of your efforts that got you there, and nine points is better than the best the other team can muster -- seven. When Steve Nash makes a great pass, Amare Stoudemire isn't going to miss the dunk.

But as the Penn women's team saw on Friday, this is not the case in soccer. The better team often loses because it can't finish.

The Penn women drew a whopping nine corners against Michigan State, and didn't score on any of them. They also got 12 shots off, had five of them on goal, but none of them saw the back of the net, losing 1-0 to the Big Ten school.

Playing a quality opponent in the Spartans, the Quakers can be happy with their effort, but not satisfied.

For a team that was fifth in shots per game, fifth in shots on target per game and yet dead last out of the eight Ivy soccer teams in goals per game (four in seven), it's not good enough for the Quakers just to get chances. They need to finish.