Offense sluggish in weekend losses

The women's soccer team was shut out twice in losses to Northwestern 1-0 and Michigan 2-0 this weekend at Bill Armstrong stadium. The losses are the first for the Hoosiers this year.\n"We're just not clicking," sophomore forward Kate Kastl said. "We're off a half a step. Our passes are too far to the left or too far to the right. We're not stepping to the ball.\n"We need to practice and get back to working as a team and not as individuals."\nThe Hoosiers played both of the games without three starters as sophomore Kristin Sprunger, sophomore Lisa Tecklenburg and sophomore Emily Markwell were all sidelined with injuries.\nKastl who was also injured near the end of Friday's loss to Northwestern. Making a play for the ball, Kastl collided with Wildcat goalkeeper Erin Ekeberg. Kastl played Sunday but did not start with a hip-pointer that caused pain most of the game.\n "I woke up (Saturday) morning, and I could barely walk," Kastl said. "It was tough to plant or turn on."\n With three scorers out or struggling with injuries, coach Joe Kelley still saw the opportunity to break through and win Sunday.\n"We couldn't finish," Kelley said. "Kendal (Willis) had her best game of the year in back, and we couldn't push one through. Jenny Mann has two great chances in the first five minutes.\n"That's two-nothing. They should've been goals." \nThe Wolverines, who now have won six straight games against IU, took the early lead Sunday scoring 19 minutes into the game. Off a Michigan corner kick, freshman goalie Shaunna Daugherty tried to punch the ball out of the box, but instead it floated straight up. When it came down, Michigan midfielder Amber Wilson was there to half-volley the ball past Daugherty.\nMichigan added the second goal off of a goalie kick by Daugherty that landed right on the foot of Michigan's leading scorer Abby Crumpton, who sliced past two defenders and shot by Daugherty.\nKastl, despite being heavily bandaged from the hip injury, had a couple of chances late to get the Hoosiers on the scoreboard including a point blank shot at Michigan keeper Suzie Grech.\n"She just couldn't turn her hips," said Kelley of the scoring chance. "If she can turn them, there's another goal."\nFriday, Northwestern forward Katie Hertz scored the game's only goal of the match with 14:36 remaining in the second half.\nHertz scored off a deflection by IU senior back Jena Kluska.\n"Jena got out there," said Daugherty after Friday's game. "I think she was half a step late. Jena was just in a bad spot, deflected it, and it got a lucky bounce. Had it not deflected I think it would have been a different story."\nThe Wildcats offense was tenacious, but the Hoosiers felt like they could have controlled it more than they did.\n"We were pretty much under pressure the whole game," junior back Whitney Butler said. "But I don't think they were too much of an offensive threat. They really didn't get that many good, quality shots. We didn't play a bad game ... as a team we didn't click."\nFriday's loss was a tough one for the Hoosiers to handle after winning their first five match-ups this season.\n"I don't think we played well," Kelley said. "We played reaction soccer. For whatever reason, 'Oh, it's the Big Ten'-thing, we played very tentative. Our backs, I think, struggled. They kept kicking the ball out of bounds, and you can't do that."\nBesides the play of the backfielders, Kelley could count many other mistakes that lead to IU's downfall.\n"I don't think we were aggressive enough," he said. "We let them have a lot of play, created too many gaps in the midfield, and I think (junior midfielder Kelly) Kram and (freshman midfielder Emily) Holtz worked hard but there was too much space to cover. We didn't do much to stop them. We can't do that."\nAs the Hoosiers hope to heal their wounds in time for next week's game with Penn State, Kelley knows his team missed two chances to jump out quickly in the conference season.\n"These are two games we should have won," Kelley said. "If they outplayed us, it would have been a different story, but that's not what happened. \n"We gave up three goals this weekend. None of them were earned"