Aggies take down Rice 2-1 on the road in Coach Shuttleworth's head coaching and Aggie debut! Off to a great start and something to build on!! Trinity Buchanan with 2 goals!

Starting with a W!

randy828 said:

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Better uphold that call

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Such a smart play by Crooks. Felt the contact and went down. Seemed right given their goal appeared offside to me.

We will take the win, but need to be better than we were in that second half. Sloppy and lack of energy.

Wins against in state non power 4 schools haven't been a promise the last few years, glad we took care of business and on the road! Rice finished runner up in their conference tourney last year and are projected 3rd in the American Conference this season

taylorswift13_ said:

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Next match is Sunday night at Baylor

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If you're going out to the game, we also have a volleyball exhibition there that afternoon. An easy twofer

Very fortunate tonight to get the win off a pk. But a win is a win. I liked the focus on possession tonight. Very different than previous seasons where we looked to win by just being the more athletic team. However, the backline is concerning and we had too many turnovers tonight. We shouldn't be giving up 18 shots to Rice (8) on goal. The backline is leaving to many players unmarked in the box. We were very fortunate not to give up another goal. Hopefully Bobby will get those things corrected before the Baylor game. As mentioned, I agree it's going to take a few recruiting classes and high quality transfers to be competitive with the top of the SEC again.

Let's hope Baylor is over confident playing us

A 3 back formation is going to take some time to figure out, especially being so young (started 2 freshmen and a sophomore back there, with a freshman goalie). I was more concerned about our midfielders not being able to hold the ball and the outside mids getting back defensively. All in all, I thought we looked pretty good for an opening game in the first half and pretty awful in the second half. I think not having Diaz also hurts our energy on offense. Churchill was good, but I can't believe she didn't finish that one look right after their goal. Looked like offside to me on their goal, but camera didn't have a great angle. Gritty win, but we will have to be better going forward. Knudsen did not dress.

It was a solid win on the road to start the season. Rice is a decent side. I'm watching more how Bobby is going to structure this squad and the program going forward than results on the field this year. Right now we don't have the athletes to compete at the top of the SEC. However, what we did see was the ball control and working for one another off the ball. The passes were intentional and our players knew what they were doing, although the execution at times wasn't great. That's a big improvement over the last few years. That stretch in the 2nd half when Rice dominated was concerning, with the backline struggling to connect with the midfield to take back some control of the match. We did find our footing and took advantage of the PK. In the first half we really should have scored 2 more goals. It felt more like a 4-2 type match but we'll take it.

I'm encouraged by what I saw, but understand it's going to be a season of ups and downs and mostly signs of potential once Bobby gets his players into the program.

Yes glad to see so many people in this thread!!! With two more road matches, hopefully we can pick up some momentum and get this fan base going for our first home match August 22nd! We play at Baylor and Texas State before 4 straight home matches against: Sam Houston, Air Force, TCU, and SFA!!

My takeaways from the game last night:

-great to win a game you play badly in. That's always hard to do.

-55 looked great up top again, creates a ton, works hard, just needs more reps to get that final product more consistant.

-tons of sloppy passing all game, was an off night for everyone all around. Second half was brutal to watch but they fought and figured out a way to win.

-back 3 did give up a ton on chances, but what they did do a great job of was staying compact and forcing everything out wide on counters. Plenty of transition chances for Rice, but the vast majority were forced to be played out wide, especially down the defenses left side, and then crosses were sent in. Would always prefer that, than the back 3 being stretched out and those transition chances coming through the middle. Would prefer to give up chances by being on the front foot and attacking than sitting 5 in the back and having zero attack like we saw a lot last year.

-19 in the middle who I praised after the UIW game didn't get any minutes as the lone 6 last night(8 played there) and she didn't look as comfortable, or as sharp, playing further up in the midfield. Still very high on her though.

-feels like this season is going to be a lot of games like this where it's exciting back and forth for 90 minutes. But would rather see this, than the rock fights we watched last year. The best thing to help the back 3 is to maintain possession. Last night with all the poor turnovers, really exposed the back line. If we have an off night, that's how the games will look all the time. On the the next one!