The men’s soccer team played its second home game of the spring on Friday against Tiffin University at Cochrane Field.
The Falcons were shutout again, 2-0, as Tiffin scored two second half goals at the 58th and 62nd minutes.
“The guys came out flat today,” head coach Eric Nichols said. “There are too many words to describe what wasn’t happening.”
As the spring continues, the Falcons will look to change lineups as they deal with injuries and inexperience.
With three seniors on the roster, the youth of the team has been prevalent.
“It is a group that is young and lacking some personalities,” Nichols said. “We have injuries, so we get to play some other guys and learn more about them.”
With the team coming out flat, they were never able to find the chemistry to push the ball and capitalize. This notion frustrated Nichols, and he hopes his team can correct the problem moving forward.
“The one word is energy,” Nichols said. “I don’t know why it would take the second goal to invigorate them a little bit, but it did. We need to be bothered from the start.”
These actions are what the team will look to correct as the spring continues.
The Falcons have struggled playing as a team, often missing valuable opportunities.
“We played dumb for big portions of the game and tried to squeeze passes,” Nichols said. “The ball movement was just too slow. There were guys open all over the place, it was just taking us too long to get the ball to them.”
While the passing looked disappointing on Friday, Nichols has been making it a point of emphasis in practice.
Even with Cochrane Field being in rough shape at the start of spring, Nichols doesn’t want to make excuses for his squad.
“Both teams played on the same bad field and they seemed to have a good time moving the ball around,” Nichols said.
The Falcons were unable to adjust properly to the field conditions. This lack of adjustment was a contributing factor in the eventual loss to the Dragons.
“You can’t play the one-touch on this surface, you have to use your two-touch,” Nichols said. “Some of the balls you usually play, you can’t play on this surface and we still tried.”
However, Nichols understands the game didn’t produce entire negativity. Nichols has been able to pinpoint an array of positives both in practice and games.
“The last twenty minutes there was a different energy,” Nichols said. “We were connecting and creating chances and that’s what we’re looking for. There were a lot more positives for us to cling onto.”
While Bowling Green has fallen short in each of their two home games, losing by a combined score of 3-0, there have been plenty of positives to come from each game.
The team is not fond of losing, but they understand that growing as a team is ultimately more important at this time of year than finishing with the higher score.
“Hopefully the scoreboard bothers them, but we had guys just not up on their game,” Nichols said. “I don’t want it to be a negative. This is spring, this is for us to get answers. We’re doing alright for never playing together.”
The Falcon soccer team will be home again this Friday, April 18, as they play the annual Alumni Game. The game will start at 7 p.m. at Cochrane Field.
