Crazy how we've held the piggies scoreless when they're basically just been practicing corner kicks for 90 minutes

Consecutive shutouts are no fun either.

It seemed like we didn't win a single ball in the air the whole second half. McDonald needs to trust her speed more. Just before the goal Ali Russell barely missed getting her foot on the ball when the Arkansas keeper bobbled it. This season is starting to feel like 2016 with all the injuries.

It was a tough way to lose tonight after such a valiant performance from a group that was outmanned and played their hearts out for each other. A&M had been an almost impenetrable wall of defense all night, swatting away chance after chance from Arkansas' elite forwards (both All-Americans) and a barrage of corner kicks (never seen so many against an A&M team at home). The way this team came out and fought so hard for every ball and just wanted it more than the Hogs in the first half was a lot of fun to watch. Some players that don't see a lot of minutes were given the opportunity tonight and they delivered. We won almost every 50/50 ball and frustrated the more talented skill players from Arkansas. If we had played this way with a full side all season, we'd only have maybe 1 loss. I'm so proud of how these girls handled themselves tonight against a truly unfair situation. They certainly deserved a tie for their efforts.

But in the end, the Razorbacks wore down a thin A&M squad and started winning most of the balls in the air and in the midfield, finally stringing together enough passes and possessions to set up scoring chances in the second half. A&M couldn't get out of its own end for long stretches, only kicking the ball forward to long runs where Arkansas just collected the ball and moved forward again, or just sending it out of bounds. A&M couldn't generate any real possession in the midfield in the last 30 minutes and continually turned it over in bad spots. McDonald had a great run through the entire Arkansas team and almost scored, but other than that we had very few chances on goal.

Injuries are always a big factor for teams competing for titles as staying healthy is key to a good season. Last year A&M was relatively injury free, leading to a conference title and deep run in the NCAAs. Unfortunately, this year has been the opposite, with now an absurd 4 (or 5 depending on how you see it) starters and several others with nagging injuries that keep them short of 100%. With Carroll and Olivieri already out for extended time (and Williams out for the season), suddenly losing both Hayes (calf) and Pante (unknown) (both of whom have been two of our best players to date) was just a gut punch to this team. Add to this Sample, Russell, and Katie Smith with various injuries, and it's just not a reasonable expectation to win games against good opponents. This would be akin to Arkansas losing both Goins and Podojil for this game. A&M has just had terrible luck with injuries this year.

The backline had a valiant effort after a few shaky performances lately. Sample had a strong game, her best in a while, and K. Smith looked a bit more like herself even with an annoying cast on her hand. They handled all the traffic and constant pressure from a direct Razorback team. Geczik had a really good game, especially in the first half, while Caldwell was solid as usual (except for long kicks down the right side of the field which were always out of bounds for some reason). The winning goal was unfortunate as we lost 3 consecutive headers in the box and the ball just fell to Podojil to tap in the back of the net. At first glance it looked like there might be an offside call but the offside player wasn't involved in the play afterward. And that happened just after A&M almost won the game on the other end with a bobbled cross from the Hog GK and Russell nearly tapping in the rebound.

A&M has had an epidemic of poor officiating this season, including tonight. I just don't understand what is going on with officials this year but they have been borderline awful and really don't know what constitutes a foul or even which team committed it. It's really a big problem that affects games and momentum.

A&M has lost back to back home games for the first time in 9 years, right after a long unbeaten streak. And now we've lost 4 in a row to the Razorbacks, which asks the question has Arkansas moved ahead of A&M as a program in the SEC? Colby Hale always seems to have the answer now against A&M, making the adjustments in the second half to win the game. The schedule has been brutal and only gets worse with Auburn on Sunday and then Tennessee and LSU on the horizon. We knew this could be a worst case scenario playing out so we'll have to just grind through it until hopefully some injured players return.