After gambling with their back line all season long, the Gators’ streak of good luck ended after only one weekend of Southeastern Conference play.
Though No. 6 Florida (8-3, 1-1 SEC) had turnover problems in losses to top-10 ranked UCLA and Florida State, it had not been held immediately accountable until three giveaways helped open a 3-0 lead for No. 12 Tennessee on Sunday.
“The way we play is pretty high-risk,” coach Becky Burleigh said. “We have had some of these mistakes during the year so far and (had) not gotten punished for them. Tennessee just did a good job of punishing us and that’s a really good lesson for us to learn.”
Instead of leaving the standard four defenders along the back line, the Gators often keep just two to shield the goalie. Burleigh said she puts a lot of confidence in her pair of fullbacks to handle the ball and keep possession.
This method can work to perfection when UF maintains pressure at the other team’s end — as a seven-goal outburst on Sept. 18 against Kansas proved — but turnovers and missed assignments can quickly leave the keeper on an island.
“There’s things we can do in practice,” Burleigh said of reducing mistakes. “We’ve got to be a little bit sharper, maybe minimize unnecessary back passes. We don’t mind playing backwards when we just want to keep possession of the ball, but when we have the opportunity to go forward and play in the other team’s half, particularly early in the game, we need to do that.”
After Georgia gave Florida fits in UF’s 1-0 win Friday, the Gators entered Knoxville, Tenn., with a chance to make an impact on the SEC East leaderboard and go up at least a game on every other team in the division.
With the 4-2 loss, though, Florida failed to claim its first victory at Tennessee in 12 years, and suffered its earliest league defeat since 2007 — when the squad exited its first weekend of SEC play with a 0-2 record.
During that season, the Gators rebounded from their miserable debut with nine straight conference wins en route to an SEC Championship. While Burleigh said there are no easy league games — especially on the road — the squad has no need to push the panic button after one loss.
“We’re still going to play the way we play, but we just have to minimize our own errors,” she said. “We can’t afford to get ourselves in a hole like that. I credit our team for the mental and physical effort to come back, but in certain situations you’re not going to be able to come back when you do that.
“This was one of them; we had too little too late.”
Contact John Boothe at jboothe@alligator.org.
