Bobcats display dominating defense

There is an old adage that states ”offense sells tickets but defense wins championships.”

Though the Georgia College & State University women’s soccer has yet to win a championship they have played well as of late thanks in part to their defense.

Head Coach Robert Parr points to changes made following the first game of the season that helped improve the defense.

“We got exposed against Newberry and then after that we turned it on. Traci Peterson moved from center midfield back to the sweeper position and that is the change we made after Newberry. When we went into Newberry, I was hoping we could run a 3-4-3 but realized that that didn’t work for us. So we moved Traci back to sweep,” Parr said. “That allowed the three in the back, who are all freshman, to play with more leadership behind them. Traci has been real critical in making sure they are where they need to be.”

The freshman defenders have been providing the team with solid performances thus far into the season and are a big reason that the Lady Bobcats have three shutouts overall in the regular season.

“We have been getting very consistent performance and match up more strength wise and speed wise with Alex Stover, Jess Kroburger, and Erin Krueger. We have some players that know how to do the job. Erin and Alex and Jess keep their cool. They don’t commit dumb fouls and don’t get rattled when a forward is fouling them,” said Parr. “They keep their composure and don’t give the ball away easily.”

“We have a core of freshman who have the potential to be here for 4 years and play together. We can only make them better with experience and time,” said Parr.

The new formation that Parr implemented following a 2-1 loss to Newberry College has also aided in the defensive surge.

“We tried going 3-4-3 at the beginning of the season because we have a lot of forwards and the idea was to see if we could get away with three forwards. We didn’t click that way. We have gone with 4-4-2 ever since the first game. I think that is how we will play the rest of the season,” Parr said.

The defense has played well of late but will need to continue to play at peak performance if the team hopes to finish strong in the Peach Belt Conference.

“The defense is looking good, they have been tested and they have done really well. I hope that when they get more experience they will continue to raise their level of play. That is really important because the games only get harder from here,” Parr said. “We will need that leadership in the back and that composure in the back.”

Posted by Colonnade Archives on Sep 17 2004. Filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry