Soccer Notes

It’s not football, although many Europeans would disagree.
The only padding is the tough plastic pieces that protect their shins. But women’s soccer is a physical sport.
“A lot of contact is inherent in the game,” Oregon head coach Bill Steffen said. “It’s a contact sport and it can be played with a certain level of physicality. There are physical challenges, and the players like that to an extent.”
It isn’t a matter of the game being dirty, but a problem that Steffen finds is that the women can’t get away with things that men can in soccer.
It all comes down to the discretion of the referee depending upon the situation and the tolerance he or she has at the time, according to Steffen.
Two Oregon players who know what it means to be physical are senior Robi Thayer and sophomore Christine Mintz. Thayer and Mintz, who are two of the tallest players on the team, find that, as defenders, they take the majority of the cards and fouls.
Thayer enjoys the opportunity to hit people, and in Friday’s game against Arizona, she found that perfect opportunity to take a shot at one of the Wildcats’ top players.
The referee declared it as “all ball” with no foul, and Thayer ended up injuring the Wildcat player for the rest of the game. Thayer looked to the injury as uplifting for Oregon, and said it helped to lead the Ducks to their first Pac-10 win.
“I love hitting people; I just love the rush of it,” Thayer said. “Just someone dribbling the ball and being able to smack them and then look at them on the ground.”
For Mintz, the aggressiveness and contact in Pacific-10 Conference soccer is not the worst she has experienced. Mintz played the 2001 season at Connecticut before being transferred to Oregon this season.
“The East Coast is definitely a more physical game and the play is much faster,” Mintz said. “East Coast is geared a lot more around weights and strength and power, versus speed on the West Coast.”
Oregon is an aggressive team and takes a strong physical approach to soccer, but the Ducks are small in size. The Ducks have three players listed at 5-feet-10, including Thayer, and 12 players under 5-feet-5.
“Both Robi and Christine are very smart, and understand the physicality of their game and their roles within the game,” Steffen said. “Are they physical? Yes. And that’s to be admired because they understand that there are physical challenges to the game and they accept those challenges and they have done pretty well with them.”
Oregon faces UCLA and USC in back-to-back matchups this weekend, and physical prowess and aggressiveness will be key for the Ducks as the two California teams rank high with strong records.

Fans, fans

and more fans
To all the fans who have supported the Oregon women’s soccer team through thick and thin, you have another reason to be proud.
Prior to the weekend, Papé Field had sported the second-highest home attendance average in the league. After six games and 4,667 total people, the Ducks were averaging 778 people per game .
With the undesirable weather conditions against Arizona and Arizona State, the average dropped to 671 per game. With a total of 5,366 people for eight games, that places Oregon fourth in the Pac-10 .
The Washington Huskies lead the league with an average of 1,256 people per game followed by Stanford at 829 and UCLA is third with 740 to edge Oregon in attendance.
“It says something about women’s soccer, especially with how this year we haven’t had a great year but we still have tons of support from the community and that they are behind us every single game whether we win or lose,” Thayer said. “To look up there and have all these fans, especially against North Carolina, is just amazing.”
Oregon went head-to-head with top-ranked North Carolina on Sept. 29 at Papé Field, and although they took a 3-0 loss, 1,588 fans came out to support the Ducks and broke the previous attendance record.
“It definitely is a motivation for us, because while we may get down on ourselves it helps to know that fans still come out to see us play no matter what our record is,” Mintz said.
Oregon fans will have one more opportunity in conference play to come out and support the Ducks. Oregon’s final home game is Nov. 8 in the home rivalry at Papé Field with Oregon State.