Rockets had their 1st exhibition last week against Wright State, and there is another Sunday against IUPUI at Hotmer. Regular season starts Thursday 8/17 at UIC.

The Batman Era Begins: 2023 Women’s Soccer Season Preview
https://utrockets.com/news/2023/8/11/wom...eview.aspx

The Rockets surprisingly kept most of their best players from last year, although I have seen that Stitch Currie transferred to WMU of all places. They do look thin experience-wise at midfield behind Dault and Mann. They do get former MAC Freshman of the Year, McKenna Schultz, back after she missed most of last season with injury. Also GK Emma Boutorwick is back after her injury last year. She had a stellar season in 2021, so hopefully she is fully healthy.

Coach brought in a ton of freshmen and one player came with from ONU to round out the roster.

Will be interesting to see how he does in hist 1st DI season.

(08-12-2023 09:36 AM)northcoastRocket Wrote:  Rockets had their 1st exhibition last week against Wright State, and there is another Sunday against IUPUI at Hotmer. Regular season starts Thursday 8/17 at UIC.

The Batman Era Begins: 2023 Women’s Soccer Season Preview
https://utrockets.com/news/2023/8/11/wom...eview.aspx

The Rockets surprisingly kept most of their best players from last year, although I have seen that Stitch Currie transferred to WMU of all places. They do look thin experience-wise at midfield behind Dault and Mann. They do get former MAC Freshman of the Year, McKenna Schultz, back after she missed most of last season with injury. Also GK Emma Boutorwick is back after her injury last year. She had a stellar season in 2021, so hopefully she is fully healthy.

Coach brought in a ton of freshmen and one player came with from ONU to round out the roster.

Will be interesting to see how he does in hist 1st DI season.

Thank you for update.... "is Hotmer" mean at home and is a typo???

(08-12-2023 02:22 PM)IamN2daRockets! Wrote:  

(08-12-2023 09:36 AM)northcoastRocket Wrote:  Rockets had their 1st exhibition last week against Wright State, and there is another Sunday against IUPUI at Hotmer. Regular season starts Thursday 8/17 at UIC.

The Batman Era Begins: 2023 Women’s Soccer Season Preview
https://utrockets.com/news/2023/8/11/wom...eview.aspx

The Rockets surprisingly kept most of their best players from last year, although I have seen that Stitch Currie transferred to WMU of all places. They do look thin experience-wise at midfield behind Dault and Mann. They do get former MAC Freshman of the Year, McKenna Schultz, back after she missed most of last season with injury. Also GK Emma Boutorwick is back after her injury last year. She had a stellar season in 2021, so hopefully she is fully healthy.

Coach brought in a ton of freshmen and one player came with from ONU to round out the roster.

Will be interesting to see how he does in hist 1st DI season.

Thank you for update.... "is Hotmer" mean at home and is a typo???

Paul Hotmer Field - the Rocket's home field. So yes at home, but no not a typo.

(08-12-2023 03:48 PM)northcoastRocket Wrote:  

(08-12-2023 02:22 PM)IamN2daRockets! Wrote:  

(08-12-2023 09:36 AM)northcoastRocket Wrote:  Rockets had their 1st exhibition last week against Wright State, and there is another Sunday against IUPUI at Hotmer. Regular season starts Thursday 8/17 at UIC.

The Batman Era Begins: 2023 Women’s Soccer Season Preview
https://utrockets.com/news/2023/8/11/wom...eview.aspx

The Rockets surprisingly kept most of their best players from last year, although I have seen that Stitch Currie transferred to WMU of all places. They do look thin experience-wise at midfield behind Dault and Mann. They do get former MAC Freshman of the Year, McKenna Schultz, back after she missed most of last season with injury. Also GK Emma Boutorwick is back after her injury last year. She had a stellar season in 2021, so hopefully she is fully healthy.

Coach brought in a ton of freshmen and one player came with from ONU to round out the roster.

Will be interesting to see how he does in hist 1st DI season.

Thank you for update.... "is Hotmer" mean at home and is a typo???

Paul Hotmer Field - the Rocket's home field. So yes at home, but no not a typo.

Aaaah....I didn't know that it was named. I rescind my typo swipe!!

The girls win 3-2 with a late goal against IUPUI. Regular season starts Thursday on the road. Unfortunately doesn’t look like it’s on +

(08-13-2023 08:56 PM)T4C8 Wrote:  The girls win 3-2 with a late goal against IUPUI. Regular season starts Thursday on the road. Unfortunately doesn’t look like it’s on +

The UIC game shows as being on ESPN+ on my schedule.

Rockets picked to finish 11th in the preseason poll.

Isabella Echeverri getting more press as part of the Spanish-language broadcasting crew for the women's world cup.

https://www.latimes.com/delos/story/2023...-s-history

Fall sports season is officially underway (along with the Batman era) as the Rockets took on UIC in Chicago and came away with a 2-2 tie.

Granted, it's the 1st game under a new coach so I expect some growing pains, but I did not think the Rockets looked very good. Especially the D which seemed lost out-of-position and confused every time UIC put the ball anywhere near the box. UT was outshot 19-7 and didn't get a corner until 20 minutes left in the game. Neither of UICs goal should have happened - one a poorly played ball by the keeper on a long free kick and the other on a scramble in the box where (literally) 6 Rockets were around the ball but somehow let the 1 UIC player tip the ball in the open net. But that being said, UIC could have scored on 3 or 4 other occasions.

Both of UT's goals came from senior forward Mojo Medalle - one after a nice long feed from ONU transfer MacBeth that the UIC keeper probably should have stopped, and the other cleaning up after a scramble in the box late in the game to tie it. She could have had a third as she had a near-tap-in that she knocked over the net early in the game.

Coach used very few subs which is surprising in the 1st game against a not particularly strong OOC opponent, and 6 players played all 90 minutes. But the announcer said in talking to him pre-game he emphasized that he has the team much fitter than last year. We will see. The announcer also "quoted" some other strange (to me) items from the coach, like that he didn't scout UIC at all as he felt it was more important to focus on his team. OK.

I was surprised that one of the best players on the field for the Rockets IMO was the player he brought from ONU, sophomore midfielder Alli MacBeth. She was calm with the ball and made some good plays.

Next game a week from today at home against Loyola Chicago.

That broadcast was brutal.

Given the preseason rankings, I’ll take that result

It seems tonight's game was postponed until tomorrow at 11. I assume that means it won't be streamed.

Rockets lose to Loyola Chicago 2-1. Again out-shot badly, 15-6. Loyola was 0-2, but both losses were to P6 teams (Illinois and Kansas) so not sure how good they are at this point.

Rockets lose to Northwestern at home, 3-1.

Not nearly as bad as I expected, after the 1st 2 games. NW was picked 2nd in the B10 and ranked in the preseason national poll. They were 2-0-1 coming in, having not given up a single goal, while beating Marquette 4-0 and Oakland 7-0 to go with a nil-nil tie against Kansas State.

Rockets gave up a ton of shots again but got some good play in goal from Redshirt Freshman Brielle Young who was making her 1st start, and the Rockets D did a much better job cleaning up the box and blocking several shots themselves. The Rockets did show a tiny bit of offense at times too putting 5 shots on frame. UT's lone goal came on a PK from Mojo Medalle late in the game, after Grace Turski put a shot off the crossbar and a NW player took down Mia Leonetti as she was chasing down the rebound. St. Ursula product Turski played pretty well for the parts of the game that I saw.

Rest of the OOC will hopefully be a bit easier, but we will have to see. They travel to Detroit next who is winless, but has a 3-3 tie against CMU. Then they are back home against DII Northwood and Oakland (who beat EMU and lost a close one to Kent.) The team is still very much a work in progress with the new coach.

Rockets get the 1st win of the Batman era, defeating Detroit Mercy 3-0. Mojo Medalle added 2 more goals to give her a MAC-leading 5 goals in 4 games. She came within a whisker of getting the hat trick, as she put another shot off the bottom of the cross-bar, but Grace Turski cleaned up the rebound for the Rockets' third goal.

The Rockets looked improved over the 1st few games, although the level of competition had some to do with that. Detroit is now 0-3-3, but the win looks slightly better when you compare to Detroit tying CMU 3-3, and losing to BGSU only 2-1 - although to be fair, BG played pretty much their entire squad that game, or the score probably would have been worse. Rockets play 2 home games next week - DII Northwood on Thursday, and Oakland on Sunday.

Medalle named MAC offensive PoW and Schultz co-defensive PoW.

Rockets beat DII Northwood 2-1 yesterday. Goals by Kaema Amachree cleaning up a rebound and Olivia Dault on a beautiful strike from distance. True freshman Kayla Flory had 6 shots and an assist in a good showing. The Rockets lost another freshman to injury as she fell backward over a Northwood player and her arm appeared to buckle as she braced herself to hit the ground.

It was touch and go for a while as Northwood actually scored 1st off a corner, that was given on a puzzling ruling by the ref, as he seemed to be the only person that saw the ball touch a UT player on the way out. The Rockets got 2 goals quickly at the start of the 2nd half to take the lead they never gave up. Although the score is unimpressive given the opponent, the Rockets could have (and probably should have) scored 8-10 goals. They had an incredible 31 shots, 14 of which were on frame. Several of the shots were point blank but were put straight at the keeper, or straight at a defender on the line. They had at least one other off the cross-bar and a few more that went wide of an open net. Definitely have to learn how to finish those chances if they want to compete in the MAC, as they are not gonna get 31 shots against even the worst MAC teams.

An interesting event in the game was a Northwood player receiving a red card for what looked like to be an attempt to grab a UT players hair braid. Pulling of hair is an ejectable offense, but the replay seemed to show that she made an attempt to grab it but didn't actually succeed. Nevertheless still ejected. Have not ever seen that in a college match before.

Rockets lose to Oakland today, 1-2.

Oakland is almost an adjunct MAC member this year having beaten EMU (and now UT), tied NIU, and lost to Kent and WMU.

No stream today for some reason and I really wish there was, because according to the stats Toledo had 5 yellow cards and one red. Oakland had 3 yellows. Wow, what was going on in this game. The red resulted in a PK and Oakland's 1st goal early in the 2nd half, meaning UT had to play almost 40 minutes down a player. That's a lot to ask of this team given they are still just trying to figure out their identity. UT's lone goal from Grace Turski tied it at 1, but Oakland got the winner late. UT's goal was it's only shot-on-goal in the match.

Back at it next Sunday against Chicago State. Chicago St is 2-5, having lost to Detroit, a team UT beat.

(09-10-2023 06:48 PM)northcoastRocket Wrote:  Rockets lose to Oakland today, 1-2.

Oakland is almost an adjunct MAC member this year having beaten EMU (and now UT), tied NIU, and lost to Kent and WMU.

No stream today for some reason and I really wish there was, because according to the stats Toledo had 5 yellow cards and one red. Oakland had 3 yellows. Wow, what was going on in this game. The red resulted in a PK and Oakland's 1st goal early in the 2nd half, meaning UT had to play almost 40 minutes down a player. That's a lot to ask of this team given they are still just trying to figure out their identity. UT's lone goal from Grace Turski tied it at 1, but Oakland got the winner late. UT's goal was it's only shot-on-goal in the match.

Back at it next Sunday against Chicago State. Chicago St is 2-5, having lost to Detroit, a team UT beat.

I know it's because of no FBS football...but Grand Valley, Oakland, and Wayne State have always seemed to be perfect fits for the MAC

Rockets beat Chicago State 4-0 to complete the OOC schedule. Mojo Medalle scored 1 to add to her MAC-leading 6 goals in 7 games. She also leads the MAC in points with 14. Rockets are 3-3-1. They did play a pretty weak schedule overall, but I was surprised to see they lead the MAC in scoring, averaging 2.0 goals per game.

Conference season starts on Thursday with a big one @ home against those dirty birds from BGSU. BG is 2-4, having played a much tougher schedule, although their only wins came against Detroit (at team UT also beat) and Loyola Chicago (at team UT lost to, 2-1).

Rockets lose the conference opener to those Falcons 2-0.

Actually, UT did not play badly, as BG did not dominate the stats, like one might have expected against the new-look Rockets. But, UT made 2 critical errors - 1 right off the bat on a just awful defensive lapse that allowed former Rocket Ellie Pool to essential tap in a goal within the 1st 2 minutes. They held there own after that, until late in the 2nd on a strange play where a BG player collided with the Rocket's keeper when the ball was already cleared away, but a PK was awarded to BG, as I guess the ref thought the keeper intentionally caused the collision.

The Rockets are playing calmer soccer of late, although they still make too many poor passes and have difficulty receiving balls sometimes. BG (as has been the case in recent years) is much faster and more skilled, but if UT had cleaned up those couple bad plays, could have come away with a tie at least. There is hope UT will win at least a couple matches in the conference.