Women's soccer struggles again in Miami

MIAMI – Whether it was caused by fatigue, inexperience, missing teammates, poor weather, or simply the stars being improperly aligned, the women's soccer team (0-2 overall) was again held scoreless Sunday, this time in a 3-0 loss to the Miami Hurricanes (3-1).

After falling to No. 3 UCLA, 1-0, on Friday night in the opening game of the Miami Tournament, No. 21 Princeton was favored to rebound against the unranked Hurricanes. Instead, a toothless offense and glaring defensive mistakes made for even more disappointing day.

In the aftermath of the two losses, as the Tigers return to New Jersey, at least this much is clear: reaffirming their status as a national power — a status earned in last year's Final Four run and now on trial — will not be easy.

While Friday night's game was played under — and eventually shortened by — lightening-filled skies, Sunday's came under the hot South Florida afternoon sun. The first half of saw a good deal of running by both teams, but the game was still scoreless at halftime. The Hurricanes had clearly created more offensive chances than Princeton, though, taking the only four corner kicks in the half and attempting five shots to the Tigers' three.

After the break, Miami slowly began to gain the upper hand, and with Sebastian the Ibis rallying the home crowd in the stands, stellar play from some of the Hurricanes' young midfielders began to open up scoring opportunities though holes in the tired Princeton defensive line.

The first goal of the game — which would turn out to be the only one Miami would really need — was initiated by a fast break pass from Akilah Moore to Rachael Rigamat in the 64th minute. Rigamat, a freshman who had dazzled the crowd with her ball control all day, wove around the final Tiger defender, and with one swift kick seemed to break down the door to the Princeton defense as she sent the ball flying past sophomore goaltender Maren Dale to make the score 1-0.

After the black-clad Tigers failed to make anything of their possession after the goal, another fast break Hurricane pass, this time from Bryn Heinicke, gave another Miami attacker, Paulette Ricks-Chambers, an open look to score the second goal of the game, just over a minute after the first one.

Princeton seemed unable to respond, with their offense failing to exhibit any sign of control over the ball. Ten minutes after Ricks-Chambers' goal, Rigamat lengthened the lead for the last time, again displaying her ball-handling skills as she dribbled from midfield through two Tiger defenders to put herself in position to find the nylon behind Dale.

"I think its more fatigue than anything else," head coach Julie Shackford said. "Not to use it as a crutch, but obviously the rest of Division-I is in their third and fourth games this weekend, and I thought on Friday we stayed pretty sharp, but I'd say there was a lot of mental and physical fatigue today. But it's so early, it's hard to really say how much of the game, and our performance, was a result of fatigue versus tactics."

Overall, Miami ended up outshooting Princeton 14-7, and Dale, in only the second start of her career, made four saves on the day. The win was a noteworthy one for the Hurricanes, who hope that they are on the brink of a turnaround season after finishing 3-13 in 2004. With the win, they tied the number of wins they achieved all of last season — coincidentally, the total number of losses the Tigers ended up with when they went 19-3 last year.

One big question that Princeton must answer in its upcoming games is how much of this weekend's poor performance was attributable to the absence of sophomore midfielder Diana Matheson. An All-America as a freshman last year, she was away this weekend while playing with the Canadian national team, and could have made the crucial difference in drawing a better performance out of the Tigers' lackluster offense. Shackford calls Matheson the team's "playmaker," and this weekend's games made it all too clear that there is no one else on this team capable of filling her shoes.

On the defensive side, the loss of junior defender Christina Costantino to a torn ACL might have made a difference this weekend. Costantino, who started all 22 games last season, will be out for the remainder of the season, and her injury forced Shackford to give more playing time to less experienced defenders, some of whom may have been at fault in Miami's fast break goals.