The N.C. State women’s soccer team defeated the North Florida Ospreys 3-2 to remain undefeated at home on Wednesday. The Wolfpack controlled play dominantly in the game, creating many opportunities for itself.
“I was very pleased with our attacking effort and how we got numbers forward,” coach Laura Kerrigan said.
This was a positive sign for the team, especially because they had just played two games over the weekend.
“A lot of us had some heavy legs,” senior forward Lindsay Vera said. “We kind of had to shake it off in the first half a little bit from playing over the weekend. We had three games in five days, but we pulled together and made a lot of scoring opportunities [Wednesday]. That is what is most important, just to know that we are creating chances for ourselves.”
Some of the scoring opportunities came from impressive individual efforts. Vera scored a goal on what her coaches told her was “the prettiest move of her career.”
“[Junior midfielder Meredith Parrilla] set me up really nice to turn, and I got past the girl in front of me, shot it, and it felt good coming off my foot,” Vera said.
Other opportunities came from the whole team working together.
“We were hitting the ball really well. We had our great moments, and my goal just happened to be off one of those great sequences,” freshman forward Paige Dugal said.
But going into the ACC season, State has the chance to improve. The team still created more opportunities than it capitalized on, tallying 16 total shots in the game and connecting on three of eight shots on goal.
“We had so many opportunities,” Kerrigan said. “Next time we’ll finish a few more of those, because quite honestly we had so many opportunities that we should have put in the goal today. The players will be the first ones to tell you that. But we created them, and the next step will be just putting them in. I think that is a small jump to make.”
Vera attributed some of the miscues to fatigue after this past weekend.
“I think some of the missed opportunities had to do with the heavy legs thing,” she said. “Everyone started to get a little worn down at the end of the game.”
Noticing that her players weren’t performing to their potential, Kerrigan started subbing players in and out early.
“It was great today to be able to sub so many players up front and keep our legs fresh,” she said. “I thought that made a big difference in terms of being able to check back harder to the ball.”
The Pack now stands at 8-2-0 after completing non-conference play. A bigger test will begin Sunday as State will travel to Duke to face the Blue Devils, who are ranked No. 10 in the nation by the National Soccer Coaches Association of America (NSCAA).
The Pack will then play three more road games, one of which is against Virginia, ranked No. 13 by NSCAA. This adds up to a tough start to the conference schedule, though the team is confident they will perform well.
“We’re not real happy the ACC assigned us that, but you know what? It doesn’t matter.,” Kerrigan said. We are going to be good on the road, we’re going to be good at home.”
