Losing five of your last six games is not how you want to go into the playoffs.
But the University of Maine women’s soccer coach Scott Atherley has been without starting German freshman goalkeeper Annalena Kriebisch for those games because of a season-ending knee injury.
He said despite the skid, he “couldn’t be happier with the level of improvement” he has seen from his youthful team.
UMaine (7-8 overall, 3-5 America East) travels to No. 4 New Hampshire, (6-8-3, 3-4-1 AE) for a quarterfinal at 7 p.m. Thursday.
“When Annalena got hurt, we were around 38th in the country in goals-against average,” said Atherley. “And it has changed the way we attack because of her ability to initiate our attack by distributing the ball with her feet and to trigger quick counterattacks with her punts.”
Kriebisch had a 0.71 GAA and a .872 save percentage.
Sophomore Samantha Cobotic has done an admirable job deputizing for Kriebisch, posting three shutouts, a 1.33 GAA and a .804 save percentage.
“She is a fantastic shot stopper. She has great reflexes. But she doesn’t have the distribution skills with her feet that Annalena has,” said Atherley, whose team has played more conservatively in front of Cobotic.
UMaine didn’t allow a restart goal (corner kick, free kick) when Kriebisch was healthy but has given up six since she got hurt, five off corners.
“When you consider that we have 17 first- and second-year players, we had only five home games and then we lost our goalie, we did well to finish fifth,” said Atherley. “I’m thrilled with the impact of our new players.”
Junior center back Kendra Ridley has had a fantastic year, according to Atherley, as has sophomore defensive midfielder Vivien Beil.
Beil leads the Black Bears in scoring (three goals, two assists) with freshman Kaitlyn Ball (2 & 3), senior newcomer Theresa Goesch (2 & 0) and sophomores Anetra Byfield (2 & 0) and Kate Evans (2 & 0) being the other multiple goal-scorers.
UMaine had a bye week last weekend, and Atherley sees that as advantageous.
To beat UNH, which it did 1-0 in double overtime on Oct. 16, Atherley said UMaine must contain 11-goal scorer Brooke Murphy, do a better job on restarts both defensively and offensively, and maintain possession of the ball.