Sept. 26, 2010
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Video interview with R. Rainey | Box Score
By RICHIE ZAWISTOWSKI
IOWA CITY, Iowa — While you can’t win them all, you can’t tie them all either.
Or so you would think.
For the second consecutive contest, the University of Iowa ended its match without a win or a loss. On Thursday Iowa tied Minnesota 1-1, and Sunday the Hawkeyes tied St. Louis in a scoreless struggle.
With the consecutive ties, Iowa moves to 7-2-2 overall, as it now continues into Big Ten play.
“We go into a part of our schedule that if we don’t play at our best we won’t get a result,” said UI head coach Ron Rainey. “That’s a good thing from a practice standpoint. It’s a good thing from a game standpoint, that nothing less than our best wins a game. So we have to take that and we have to go out and work hard in practice as we prepare for Wisconsin.”
While a tied match certainly isn’t the same as getting a win, it does offer some comfort knowing that the team may not have won, but also did not allow the other team to win, either. In a scoreless game, one goal would be the difference in a win or loss. Iowa did not give up a goal.
“The best thing about today and the overtime is that we didn’t give up a goal,” said Rainey. “It was a frustrating game where we had some pressure, we had a lot of shots on goal, but we didn’t put the ball in dangerous enough areas to finish. We need to do a better job sometimes of making plays in the 18, and maybe that turns a little bit different.”
Freshman Leah DeMoss had an opportunity to put a goal on the board and end the scoreless struggle, but could not capitalize.
“I had a breakaway and I know I missed it, and I wish I would have took a touch around the keeper and finished it, so it wouldn’t have been a 0-0 game,” said DeMoss.
While Iowa tied Minnesota earlier in the week, both Rainey and DeMoss did not find the game against Saint Louis to be similar.
“We had two draws this week, and we felt a lot different against Minnesota than we do right now,” said Rainey. “So I think we kind of missed out on an opportunity to get after an opponent.”
“I honestly think when I look at it, we were so much more up for the Minnesota game than we were for this one,” said DeMoss. “I think if we played how we did against Minnesota it would have been a completely different outcome out there.”
As Big Ten play resumes for the Hawkeyes, the tough contests could come in handy. Iowa had previously defeated opponents by as much as 6-0, but coming off two consecutive tie games, Iowa can use the experience to their advantage that they would not have had.
“Again, the best thing that you can say is that we didn’t give up a goal,” said Rainey. “As we went through those overtime games, that was something we wanted to get better at from last year, having good results in overtime. Now we have two ties. “Hopefully that will give us confidence the next time we’re in that situation to know we can shut a team down in the last 20 minutes.”
Iowa travels to Madison, Wis., on Sunday, Oct. 3, to take on the Badgers.