The Hawkeyes need a win to keep Big Ten Tournament hopes alive.
By Courtney Baumann
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It’s the halfway point in Iowa soccer’s conference season, and the team has yet to win a game in the Big Ten.
Wisconsin has traveled to Iowa City, and the Hawkeyes are ready to put a tally in the win column.
Iowa’s most recent disappointment came in Bloomington, when the team tied 0-0 in double overtime with Indiana.
In a game the Hawkeyes thought it was going to win, the tie felt more like a loss.
“It was pretty heartbreaking for us. In the locker room, it was pretty quiet,” senior Brooke Backes said. “We talked about how it’s pretty much now or never now. We have to be all in and give everything we have for the rest of the season; otherwise, it is going to be short.”
The Hawkeyes suffered two losses to the Badgers last year, one during the regular season, and the other in the Big Ten championship game. The Hawks should have a bit of a chip on their shoulders, but they are young enough that not many players were there for the game one day short of 11 months ago.
To rub it in just a bit more, Wisconsin honored its women’s soccer team last season for winning the Big Ten Championship during halftime of the Iowa/Wisconsin game.
“Not a lot of the kids that played in [the Big Ten Championship] are back,” Hawk head coach Dave DiIanni said. “Rather than thinking of that, for us this year, it’s more that we really just need to get points out of Wisconsin.”
The Badgers come into the game with a Big Ten record of 3-1-1. Their only loss came to Penn State — a 4-0 rout in University Park, Pennsylvania. However, the Badgers gave Minnesota — which is at the top of the Big Ten — its only conference loss.
A major strength of the Badgers, Backes and DiIanni said, is their ability to force a team to one side.
In order to alleviate the pressure that will come from Wisconsin, Iowa has been practicing the ability to switch the ball across the field in order create scoring opportunities. The hope is that the Hawkeyes can create those opportunities before the Badgers can recover and make it to the other side. This will also help the Hawkeyes avoid getting trapped.
With only six games remaining in the conference season, Iowa needs to start earning points quickly — which means today would be a vital win.
The team knows it, too.
When asked about being halfway through the season, redshirt freshman Aubree Larson said it came up on the team quick. She also said the team has to remain focused.
“We have to focus on each opponent and put all of our effort in, because if we’re not going to, our season will end sooner than we want it to,” she said.
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