Janet Rayfield Quotations

Our defense was solid except for the lapse right after our goal against Illinois State. Our veterans in the back are growing into their increased roles of communicating and organizing, and our young backs showed a much greater understanding of our defensive philosophy since the start of the spring. This defense will be more than ready come August.

This tournament will help us see where we are and see what we need to continue to work on in spring workouts. Our main goal for the spring is to solidify our young defense.

Regardless of results or performance, the ability to interact and impact the young student-athletes involved in the Chicago SCORES program was a great opportunity for all of our student-athletes. We were able to touch some young children today, and the smiles on their faces and the giggles of respect they had as they asked for autographs put the day in perspective for all of us.

We haven't even been thinking about Penn State yet. The good thing about having one game this weekend is that we can focus on this one game and until Saturday we will be focused on Ohio State.

The great thing about this event is it gives our players something to compete for in the spring. They try to establish themselves as the best program in the state, even though it's unofficial.

We saw our goals come from a lot of people and a lot of different things. Our goals are a result of a lot of work, like people framing the goal, and causing problems in the box. We also have some dangerous weapons on restarts, and we were able to capitalize on them last week.

It was a good goal that came from some good soccer, so you've got to like that. It was good for Ella to get the goal; she worked extremely hard all game. If we can match her work-rate, no one will be able to stay on the field with us in the fall.

The knee is getting tighter, which is good. It's a long season and the 10 days of rest that she'll get will probably make her a lot stronger for the next seven Big Ten games, which is more important than having her for this one game.

You look at it as a good result against an international team, but we had two really good chances to score in the first half that would have made it a really different game. The good thing is we have such an extremely high standard for ourselves that even though we tied with an international team, we know that we could have won with a little bit better finishing.

Six goals in 180 minutes is good offensive production and if we can carry those numbers into the fall we will be dangerous. Ella had a very productive day and was consistently dangerous. Our passing was not as sharp as it needs to be in order for us to be as strong collectively on offense as we are individually.