After having two strong performances against Cleveland State and Chicago State, including the first victory of the season, the BG women’s soccer team dropped its last game 3-0 at home to the Detroit Titans.
Head coach Lindsay Basalyga said the 8-0 win for the Falcons over Chicago State has taken a lot of weight off her players’ chests, yet after the loss to Detroit she first criticized her teams’ culture.
“I definitely think for us that game [against Detroit] was kind of a check moment for us as a program,” she said. “We have had some pretty big moments over the last couple of weeks and our team is ready for that next step.”
The Falcons have the opportunity to take that next step this Friday in a non-conference game when they take on the Butler Bulldogs.
Butler comes off a four game winning streak, including a 2-1 overtime victory on Wednesday at Northern Kentucky. The Bulldogs have an overall season record of 5-4-0.
Sophomore Paige Amodio said the Falcons have put the troubles they were going through and the adversity behind them.
“We are looking to this game with great positivity not really thinking of all the negative stuff that’s happened so far,” she said. “Everyone is competing, everyone is ready to go and we are excited.“
Friday’s game will be the last competition before BG will start their Mid-American Conference play next week. Butler, a Big East team, has played three MAC teams so far posting a 3-2 win over Ohio University and losses to Eastern Michigan as well as Miami.
Sophomore Jessica Creech expects a good fight against the Bulldogs yet she said they are nothing the Falcons haven’t seen before.
“We need to keep doing what we were doing in the beginning of the season,” she said. “We have to start on our toes with a fire under us, we have to come out flying at them and press hard.”
Basalyga said changing the culture is part of the team’s process and the game against Detroit was an “aha” moment for her players, from which the team learned valuable lessons.
“Being just a little bit more disciplined and trusting ourselves, believing in that at any moment we can win a game and at any moment we can come from behind, at any moment we can score, it’s just a belief system,” she said. “I have the utmost faith in this collection of players that we are going to continue in our process.”
The Falcons start their five game road stretch against Butler in Indianapolis on Friday at 7 p.m.
