Long Beach State Women’s Soccer isn’t about 4-0 victories like the home opener on Friday against Gonzaga. Mainly, the program’s recent success is the result of stellar local recruiting by coach Mauricio Ingrassia. But more specifically, it’s all about the defense.
Long Beach won 12 games last year, five by shutout, and only allowed seven goals in those victories. Beach ball was defensive almost to a fault. A few times last season they had trouble putting away inferior teams, but if Friday’s 4-0 shellacking is any indicator, that fault has been addressed.
It’s no secret the 2008 version of Mauricio’s machine is the most talented squad the school has ever seen, but it’s still 11 on the field, and four on the back line. That back line will need to be solid and consistent if this program is to continue its up tick. After two games, it looks like a fearsome foursome is coming together quite nicely.
Third-year starter Sara Baca has played some midfield, but her scrappy, aggressive play sets a good tone on defense. You could call her the sweeper, but most sweepers don’t run up to the midfield line with purpose like Baca does. To her right, senior Tiffany Vaught adds more smarts and experience to the defensive unit. It’s Ingrassia’s plan to have these senior leaders support the squad’s youth in back.
The only freshman starter on Friday was Mayfair grad Nicole Hubbard. One of three sophomore starters was Oregon transfer Bo Rael. Hubbard and Rael looked a little shaky on defense early in the scrimmage against San Diego State, but they looked like veteran teammates on Friday. With the help of Baca and Vaught’s communication and leadership, Long Beach gave up two shots on goal.
“These last two weeks have been great building weeks,” said Baca. “We’ve come a long way during the double days and training and worked a lot on our defense and staying together as a unit playing in the back.”
All that said, a defense is only as good as its goalkeeper, and Ingrassia’s got two good ones. Liz Ramos has been the team’s keeper for three years. This year she can set school records for time played, goals against average, shutouts, and total saves. This team is so deep that Ramos didn’t even play on Friday. Senior Breanna Truelove, who started four games last year when Ramos was injured, tallied the first shutout of her Long Beach career.
“Breanna has been doing great, and Liz is doing great as well… we’ve got two great keepers,” said Ingrassia, who is 46-26-7 at LBSU. “Liz will start on Wednesday… right now they’ll both get playing time.”
Like a chemist, Ingrassia will use these pre-conference games to learn more about how mixing different players will affect his experiments performance. Whatever the outcome, the formula will be full of ingredient D.