Patrick Baker Good Quotations

I think a little bit of what we were doing in the fall came out in our play today. The whole team defended well from top to bottom and we limited the good looks on goal for our opponents. To go three games without giving up a goal is a pretty good compliment to the team.

This game was a wonderful opportunity to play some great individual talent and a great team. We did some good things tonight but we also made some mistakes. Good teams will make you pay for those mistakes and North Carolina did. Overall I'm very pleased with the effort. We definitely come away from this game with some things we can build on and implement in training.

That weekend is a tremendous opportunity for us. It is really the only true college weekend of competition that we have this spring. We play two very good teams in UAB and the traditional powerhouse of North Carolina. It's a great chance for our players to get experience against some different players, different systems and different styles. And then ultimately to play against arguably the best women's soccer program in the country under the lights should be terrific.

When we defend well and create opportunities on offense, that's really our recipe for success. Once again we had great activity and pressure on the ball. We matured a little bit tonight, we had a greater sense of gamesmanship and clock management toward the end. We saw some good things from the whole team.

We are playing a lot of different teams with various styles this spring. I think the spring schedule is going to help us a lot. We're not going to get caught up in wins and losses. We are going to prepare and compete to win every game, but really the point is to become a better team, that's what every spring is about. Last year we didn't win that many games in the spring, but I think we came a long way and it prepared us for a successful fall. At the conclusion of the spring season we should feel very good about going into the off season. I hope we make the same strides this spring that we made last year. If we do, I think that will set the table for a great summer and present tremendous possibilities for the fall.