When the Marquette women’s soccer head coaching baton was passed to Chris Allen in January, he inherited a team that would go five games into the season before tasting their first win and be outscored 9-2 during that same time period.
After a 2023 campaign where they were outscored 1:3 and had an average shots per game that was half of their opponents, Allen said they’re trying everything this year to see what will work. In the first six games of this season, the team has had 20 different starters, 12 different players that have made their first career starts and eight who have made their NCAA Division 1 debuts.
With this new set of Marquette soccer faces, he’s trying to improve the attack by building a strong defensive foundation. He said that if the team can make high presses and force turnovers high up the field, it can initiate their attack to have more opportunities on goal than they’ve had in the past.
“We’ve talked a lot about the word identity: the identity of who we are as an attacking team, a defending team and who we’re becoming from a program standpoint,” Allen said. “I think when you talk identity, you begin to talk philosophy, tactics and then personnel. We’re trying to get all these three things aligned for us.”
Another new face, assistant coach Chelsea Davis, is the team’s offensive coach. She holds a wealth of knowledge about the sport through her time as a student-athlete, club and college-level coach and professional player with Sweden’s Bollstanäs Sportklubb.
She likes to think of working on the team’s abilities as thirds of a puzzle. The attacking third, where they hope to grow the most, focuses on the small details.
“We do have some nice switch of play, and we give good connective passes,” Davis said. “Now, it’s going into the final third: that execution piece. That’s probably one of the hardest parts of the game. I have found that with any team that I have coached. It’s about the timing and finding the right relational play, so I’m not surprised that this is where we’re at, especially with the new identity.”
Allen and senior midfielder Tess O’Connell said their new identity is strengthened by two powerhouse forward veterans who display conviction with the call: junior Josie Bieda and senior Kate Gibson.
“Allen and Chelsea’s attacking pieces of their tactics is high energy and high press,” O’Connell said. “They want us to go take chances and being courageous in the 18 is something that we can all work on.”
“Bieda’s goal [against the Minnesota Gophers on September 6] was a really good example of that. She took a chance, put a shot on frame, and got a wonderful goal out of it. That’s the biggest piece that they’re instilling in us: being confident going to goal.”
38′ | MU-1 | MINN – 0 | Bieda’s first goal of the season gives Marquette the lead. pic.twitter.com/KDMe5dqO0n
— MARQUETTE Soccer (@MarquetteWSOC) September 1, 2024
Allen said he doesn’t want to sacrifice their defense by putting all their effort into attacking because that’s where they’re strongest. Though, two goals a game is something that he said he wants to see on the horizon.
“We have to start executing on the opportunities that we are being given,” Allen said. “We like our shots on goal percentage, but we are simply not generating enough shots. If we can start putting more shots on frame, be more efficient and generate more opportunities, good things will happen to us.”
For the past three games, Marquette’s shot on goal percentage has been 0.573 with their opponents at 0.48. Davis said that they have the resources to get these shot opportunities, they just need to complete the puzzle of fine details to get them.
“They’re a really talented group, they really are, which is why it’s been frustrating to not find consistency and fluidity within the attack.” Davis said. “We are needing to figure out how they all mesh together because they’re all different in their individual ability. We need to dive in as a coaching staff and find a way to translate that onto the field.”
This story was written by Ben Hanson. He can be reached at benjamin.hanson@marquette.edu or on Twitter/X @benhansonMU.