After an early score by Cooper during the Sep. 10 game, head coach Benjy Kent said the team struggled mentally through the rest of the game. 

“The biggest thing right now is just psychologically, everybody gets up for a winning season when they find out they want to play soccer, and they forget you have to actually do certain things to be a winning team,” Kent said. “You have to play as a team, you have to work as a team, you have to support each other as a team. Psychologically, we’re kind of all over the board.”

Junior and captain Alma Beaton said she felt like the team struggled to concentrate and was distracted throughout the game.

“It was definitely one of our worst games so far this season,” Beaton said. “Everybody kind of got really frustrated with the referees and the other team, and then kind of lost some focus on the game.”

Even though Beaton believed it was a rough game, she said the team was able to create strong combinations that led to scoring opportunities.  

“I like some of the chances, we had good combinations up top a couple times, which were really fun to see. So we did create a couple good chances.” Beaton said.

According to junior and captain Sophia Romero, in future games, it is important for the team to take chances and turn them into goals.

“We definitely had a lot of scoring opportunities, and sooner or later, we’re gonna be able to put them in the back of the net.” Romero said. 

Kent said he hopes the team can improve by playing better and allowing the game to fuel the innovative moments. 

“Tactically, we’ve got to be a little smarter, pick the right moments to be creative and deceptive, not try to do it every time,” Kent said. “Play more simple and let the creative moments kind of develop with the game.

Although it was a tough loss for Park, Romero said she wants the team to come together so they can start to win more. 

“As long as we’re playing together and we’re not getting too frustrated, we’ll be able to come together and hopefully score some goals,” Romero said.