Saúl Berríos-Thomas | Layout Editor
Freshman forward A.J. Barrofio tracks down the ball on the right sideline during Sunday’s 3-0 loss to Marist. The Dukes have scored only one goal through three games this season. They’ll face Navy and Towson in Annapolis, Md. this weekend in the Navy Invitational.
The Duquesne women’s soccer team showed their inexperience on Sunday by letting Marist (2-1) outplay them as the Dukes (1-2) lost to Marist 3-0 at Rooney Field.
Coach Al Alvine was disappointed in the effort put forth by his young team.
“I thought they beat us in every way. They out hustled us, out worked us [and] out chanced us,” he said.
The first goal came with 10:32 left when a Duquesne defender tried to head the ball back to junior goalie Devon Tabata. The ball took an awkward bounce and went straight to junior midfielder Jamie Strumwasser who found Alycia Cartica, senior forward, for the open shot and goal.
Tabata explained her perspective.
“The backline had a miscommunication and anytime you let that happen you are vulnerable,” she said. “You hate to see something like that happen.”
The Dukes had four corner kicks and two free kicks, but could not connect with any of them.
“We don’t have enough players that want to get on the end of crosses,” Alvine said. “We work on it all the time in practice. That was a problem we had all over the field, the corner kicks are just a microcism of that. They wanted the ball more than we wanted the ball and they won the ball.”
“We were not focused and everyone was a little off,” senior midfielder Stephanie Colon added.
When the Dukes came out flat in the second half it was apparent they were not going to be able to rally. That is when the final two goals occurred. Freshman forward Danielle Glazer put the first nail in the coffin when she put a high shot home from just over twenty feet out in the 53rd minute. Then, senior forward Maria Moreno, put a good shot from medium range in the back of the net.
The Red & Blue have only scored one goal in their first 272:13 of action this season. The stagnant offense is forcing Alvine to make some adjustments.
“We are going to have to mix-and-match some things. We are going to have to make some changes I think personnel wise,” he said.
“It is one game and we are not going to get too crazy over one result,” he added. “I’m not looking for any one player to do it. We are in a position this year where we have freshman as our attacking players so they are going to have to be the ones to make things happen for us.”
“We have a lot of depth on our team; we have a lot of players off the bench that can do big of things for us,” Tabata agreed.
The Dukes are headed to Annapolis, Md. where they will face Navy and Towson in the Navy Invitational. The Dukes have six games remaining before conference play begins and if they don’t get things rolling before then it could be a long season.
