Women's soccer faces off against USC in NCAA Tournament

Coming off of an electrifying victory in front of a raucous Princeton crowd, the women’s soccer team looks to continue its success on the road, as it travels to Charlottesville, Va., to take on the University of Southern California Trojans at 4 p.m. on Friday.

The Tigers (14-3-1 overall, 6-0-1 Ivy League), who haven’t lost in over 2 months, hope to keep alive what has been a turnaround season so far. After back-to-back years without a trip to the postseason, the Tigers find themselves on the cusp of the round of 16.

As the team’s last time in the postseason was in 2012, nearly all of its players are new to the postseason experience and are experiencing the thrill of the win-or-out atmosphere for the first time.

“The atmosphere’s been great. I think we’ve come even closer as a team, and it’s exciting that, since we won the Ivy League, [this] gets to continue,” junior forward Tyler Lussi said. “It’s an amazing feeling to represent the entire Ivy League. We’ve done so much work and … the entire team is really excited.”

Much of the excitement throughout the postseason is due to the fact that the team is out of Ivy League play and is going head-to-head against foes hitherto unseen. The match against Boston College was the program’s first in history, and the Tigers don’t have much experience against a PAC-12 team like USC (15-5-1 overall, 9-2-0 PAC-12).

“Playing within the Ivy League [is] incredibly competitive. Each team knows our strategies, we play every year against each other … so to play different teams is always really exciting, and it’s a new experience. “ Lussi said. “We do scouting reports, but we don’t focus so much on the other team, we focus on what our strengths are and improving every day.”

“It’s an exciting feeling to play a different team, especially a team you’ve never played before, and to find out what their strengths are and counter that with what our strengths are,” Lussi said.

While the Tigers may not have much game experience with USC, it’s clear that defeating USC means breaking what has been a wall-like defense on the past few outings. The Trojans have shut out their opponents in five of their last six games, and on the season gave up just .67 goals on average per game. This stands in stark contrast to the roaring Tigers offense, which has put in 2.56 goals on the season, and is coming off of a 4-goal outing against BC.

The key to victory, Lussi posits, is for the Tigers to stick to their guns and continuing to keep the opposing defense on their toes as they’ve done all year.

“From the start, we pressure their defense early,” Lussi said. “The entire team needs to play high pressure, to keep the ball in their defensive end. We can just possess the ball in their area and that will give us more chances.”

“If we can just play our game, and not get sucked into their game,” Lussi said. “It’ll be easier for us to put the ball in the back of the net.”