Marquette University Athletics
Steve Adlard's Coaching Diary
11/10/1999 12:00:00 AM | Men's Soccer
Once a week during the soccer season, Steve Adlard, Marquette University's head men's soccer coach, will share his thoughts on the Golden Eagles' squad
November 10, 1999
Q: This week your team enters the Conference USA Tournament and will play Cincinnati in the first round. Your thoughts entering the weekend.
A: Cincinnati started the season like gang busters and were regarded as a tremendous team. A lot of people were saying that they were for real. They have faded of late which is good and bad. The good side is that they aren't playing as well as they were earlier in the season. The bad side, in a sense, is that they know that they're a good team at this point, establishing credibility by beating teams like Connecticut. They know they can play and, more importantly, they know it's on the line. This is the one avenue to be successful and get to the national tournament having made for the first time last year. So, they will be very fired up and focused. Plus, they'll be angry that we beat them earlier this season.
I see this as a tremendously difficult game and expect Cincinnati to come hard at us. We've played them in this particular early round of the conference tournament three times in my recent history. Each time the game has been less skillful and less entertaining than previous encounters between the teams. I sense that this is the problem of playing early in a tournament -- it's the early tournament game that you know you have to win, but you can't relax enough to play your normal game.
Q: By the time you play Cincinnati, your team will have had a 10-day layoff. Talk about the effects that could have on your team.
A: The American system doesn't really lend itself to having long breaks. The way the seasons are set up in all sports, it seems like you are playing constantly with very few long breaks between games. So, in that sense, it's a problem. In terms of recovering from injuries and getting fully refreshed, it's very good. The question remains of focus and in sharpness. You haven't played in 10 days, so you can't actually say we're doing this right or we need to fix something because there is no frame of reference. I think that players always find it very hard to see a game that is 10 days away. I'd say on balance that it is negative. I think that the only side that I could pull on for support is that we will be fresh, we will be healthy and we will go into it ready to play.
Q: In a tournament setting teams face a one game and maybe you're done scenario. How does your team approach that type of situation as opposed to a regular-season contest?
A: We sometimes say things like that to them, but I'm not sure that we should be really saying those things. You have to read your team and each year the mentality is different. These players may not be as mature as some of the football or basketball players in that their backgrounds have been insulated somewhat and they've been told everything will come out right. And the more you put pressure on them that it's a big game, in fact they struggle with that. Only certain players seem to be able to cope with that pressure so I try not to say very much about that. They realize that the winner takes all and everybody else goes home.
If I had to look to an area of optimism, it is that we've been in this situation, fortunately, every year I've been here. Since we have been in Conference USA, we've been relatively successful. We've been in the final game twice and the semifinals probably four times. So the continuity within the program is such that we have been there and that is an important asset. By the same token, Cincinnati has not been in this situation, but I think it falls back on the fact that they know they have to win to make the NCAA Tournament.
Q: In your experiences, what are the keys to success in tournament play?
A: In my previous experiences at UNC Asheville, we made the semifinals of the conference tournament every year. One of the reasons for that was that we built the season towards the tournament, where that was the pinnacle. We had our teams prepped to where this was where the whole season was leading.
At Marquette, this is the environment that we live in now. I think that we have to prepare our team each season to get good enough to be at its best and to do it at will. You can't say, well we had a bad day and we'll be better tomorrow. Everything is geared to where it has to be now. That's the way the training has gone. You refine your game plan, you establish a style and you put the best people on the field who are playing well at that time. But the whole focus has been this is where it has been leading the past three months.
