bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on your game at Louisiana Tech?
Blair Quinn: It wasn't really any different than the rest of the games. We defend really well, we make one mistake and get punished for our mistake but we don't punish other teams for theirs. Until we start doing that we're going to keep having the same 1-0 result.

bc.net: In terms of not capitalizing on other teams' mistakes what are the things that are really sticking out in not being able to do that?
BQ: It's a complete and total lack of being able to go to goal dangerously. Teams turn the ball over to us in dangerous areas because we press well and defend well. As soon as we get the ball into the final third we don't make good decisions, we don't do enough things to create danger.

In my opinion over my years in the game, you typically have to create eight to ten chances for every goal that you want to score and we're not getting to eight or ten right now.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: You've had a few tough losses over the last couple of weeks but your team has competed really well and even though you had a 5-0 loss at Texas Tech, three of those goals would have been tough for any goal keeper to stop.
Blair Quinn: Yeah, they're very good. They're better than we are. That's a fact. He's a better coach than I am. That's a fact. With all that said we still competed very well. To be honest, that game actually, we could have had two or three goals. Their goal keep made at least two fantastic saves and the third was really good. I don't think it would have changed the outcome of the game but it would have been nice to get a couple goals. I think we had finally been doing the right stuff attacking wise and taking the right shots, she just made a couple of amazing saves.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on your weekend out in California, you pick up a tie against UC Riverside and a win against Southern Utah.
Blair Quinn: It was a good weekend overall in terms of going on the road and coming back without loss. It sounds kind of negative but to get a win and a tie on the road is a good thing. We played really well Friday night. I think we actually played better on Friday night when we tied than on Sunday night when we won.

bc.net: What were some things that you liked from your team on Friday?
BQ: On Friday our attacking pieces were coming together pretty well. The midfield and the forwards were connecting pretty well and we were creating a lot of dangerous chances. We actually probably four or five breakaways in that game that we were just unfortunate to score one of them. We actually scored two but they called one back for offside.

bc.net: In the Sunday game against Southern Utah you picked up your first win of the season.
BQ: Yeah, that game was more of a grind-it-out grit and determination game. We really didn't play that well on the attacking side of the ball. The rhythm and dangerous kind of attack that we had Friday we just didn't have on Sunday. Neither team really had it, it was just more of a grind-it-out kind of game. There weren't a lot of long possessions for either team it was just kind of back and forth. We actually got a goal against the run of play. We had been really out played for the ten minutes or so prior to us scoring but it was a nice goal.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the opening weekend games against Boise State and Idaho State?
Blair Quinn: It was good in some aspects. You never want to lose both of your opening games, that's frustrating. But there were definitely some good things out of it. Speed of play is one of those things that's hard to judge until you play somebody else. I think that was something we learned very quickly that we weren't playing fast enough. As a coaching staff that was something we were trying to impress on them all week during practice but again until you do it it's just hard to figure out. We figured out that we need to be playing faster and attacking with a more dangerous intent instead of just attacking to attack randomly.

bc.net: What were some things specifically that you saw in the opening game against Boise State that you were pleased with?
BQ: Our midfield play. I thought our midfield played well especially defensively. They were pretty good at making the defensive shifts that they were supposed to make depending on where the ball is. I thought our back line played pretty good for the first game and Jess Schutter made two good saves in that game. Giving up goals is part of soccer. You always want to get a shutout but if you give one up you should still be okay because you're always expecting to score at least one. We just didn't get the one we were looking for. There were definitely some good things in that game.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: How has fall practice gone and where do you see your team heading into the opening weekend this weekend?
Blair Quinn: I think it's gone well overall. It's a long process and you get 16 days between your first day of preseason to your first game and that's never ever long enough to teach everything you need to teach but you try to hit all the main points. It was easier this year in regard that we returned about 95 percent of our team and we have four new freshmen coming in. Teaching, instead of teaching 27 new people we were reteaching 22 people and teaching four new people so that was nice.

bc.net: What are you looking for from your team in the first couple of games and in particular the season opener against Boise State?
BQ: The biggest surprise of the year is always the first game of the year because the only thing you know about a team is what you know about them historically as a program, they tend to play this system or that system. They have new players so what you know about them is kind of limited and really what you know about yourself is limited because you really haven't been tested in a game. What we're really looking for is to ideally play as many of our players that are traveling as possible and see how they stack up at game pace. That's the thing we've really been trying to stress since Monday is to play at game speed and I don't think that we're there yet to be very honest with you. I don't think we're playing fast enough yet. We're making some good decisions but I think the decisions are being executed too slowly. I really just think that's a product of not having played a real game yet and of course that won't happen until you play. That's what we're trying to get out of the first game, figure out what game speed is and figure out what our speed is in relation to that and see how many players we can get involved and have them playing well in the first game of the season.

bc.net: From the beginning of last season to the end of last season there was a pretty significant progression in the way your team played and how you wanted them to play, especially offensively. What growth have you seen over the offseason and through the first couple weeks of camp?
BQ: I think that's actually been the place we've grown the most is in the attack. I don't know if it's necessarily more options but the options are better. The kids got better over the spring. I think several of them made the commitment to get better of the summer and our attack is connecting better. That's always the hardest piece to put together. That's the piece that takes the most time to sort out. The actual timing of the pass and the timing of the run and who you're playing with and what their tendencies are. Defending quite frankly is hard work to begin with. There's always a system to defend within but individual defending comes down to working hard and playing smartly so that tends to come together a little more quickly than the attacking piece does.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the 2012 class overall?
Blair Quinn: The class in general is a good class. To be honest, as late as we got them for the 2012 recruiting class, we were lucky that they were still available. College women's recruiting is going super fast, it's usually two years out or more and for these kids to still be available, we feel pretty fortunate. Every one of them could come in and we think make an impact in the first year. I think the only thing that'll really determine that is how quickly they pick up the speed of the college game. All of them bring a technical ability with them or a certain amount of athleticism and speed, it's just a matter of how quickly they pick up the speed and pace of the college game, that'll determine how much they play. The idea with this class was to begin adding quality depth, not just numbers. The first two years of the program they had so many kids, and you have to do that to start a program, unfortunately when that happens you get a lot of turnover in the first couple of years and so there was a lot of turnover even right up to the time before I got here. I think out of the 30 or so kids that started the program that first year, I want to say nine are left now. That just happens. I think with this class now we've been able to add quality depth in every position, mid-field and back position.

bc.net: When you're going out and recruiting for this class, after seeing what type of players you had in the program, what specifically were some things that you were looking to bring in to suit your system and your style of play.
BQ: To be honest, some kids that were a little bit more comfortable with the ball than some of the kids we have. We needed some more kids that were just better technically in their one-v-one dribbling ability and possession passing ability. I've said since day one that we're very much a possession style team and that's really not just lip service. We play through our midfield and to be honest we still didn't do it as much as we wanted. I think we needed more kids that were really comfortable with the ball regardless of their position, whether they were a back or a mid or a forward but specifically the mids and forwards, just to give us a better chance to attack as a team, more goal scoring opportunities. We need to score more than 30 goals a season.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the final game against Fresno State in the WAC Tournament this past Friday?
Blair Quinn: We ran into a very good Fresno State team who quite frankly played better this past Friday in the tournament than they did the week or two prior when we played them at their place for regular season. I don't know if that had something to do with them being fresh and us having played the day before as opposed to the last time we played them we had each played pretty tough games that Friday and had to go in and play that Sunday as well. They were more prepared to play that game than we were both physically and mentally. They are very, very good.

bc.net: When you take a look at the season overall you finished 10-8-3, a winning record. How important was that in your first season to meet a couple of your goals, have a winning record, you reached the conference tournament and you also won your first conference tournament game.
BQ: Those were all big steps for the program as a whole. Especially for these kids that have been here from the beginning. I hope that they see it that way. The program continues to get better and it's because of them. Getting the 10 win season is nice. Double-digit wins is always something you want as your minimum goal, you're always hoping for more and as you look back there's always a couple of games that you kind of go, "We could have won that one if… or we should have done that and could have won if…" But it was nice to get the 10th win, it was really nice to qualify for the tournament again so the kids didn't feel like in their first year it was an anomaly because they were new. I think they understand they earned it that first year and they earned it again this year. Now everybody that's on the team has been and everybody's coming back. We'll have five kids next year approximately that won't have been to the WAC tournament which is huge. I think having that under their belts is nice and even playing in the games that led up to the tournament, we had to get points out of those. The tie at Fresno, the win at home against Hawai'i. Those were like playoff games, we had to win those or get points out of those. Those are all big steps for the program in terms of where we're headed.

Looking back overall, I think the kids were happy with the season as well but I know they were disappointed with some things too and that's good. That's a good sign. That means they know that they can do more and that they want more. Anyone that's competitive should have that feeling. That's a good sign as well.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: In each of the two halves it looked like Hawai'i came out a little faster than you did but your girls settled in and especially in the second half you really dominated play.
Blair Quinn: That's pretty accurate, I definitely think we got outplayed the first 20 or 25 minutes, they played better soccer than we did. It wasn't lack of effort, we weren't playing our style. We were playing very one dimensional, very direct and it was causing us problems because were weren't getting out of our end fast enough and closing space and it was because we didn't have the ball. I think it's something that we were very fortunate that Jennae scored right before halftime and that's what we call a dirty work goal. She was just doing hard work as a forward, crossing their back and was able to block a clearance. It fell for her nicely and she actually finished it really nice. She caught the keeper about halfway out and just drilled one right underneath the bar.

We were a little bit fortunate to be 1-1 at halftime. We came out much better in the second half playing wise, again though, we were under pressure first though for about the first five or ten minutes until we finally settled and started playing our rhythm. Our midfield was much better in the second half.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the victory over Hawai'i, you went into the game knowing you had to get off to a fast start, you got the corner kick very early and that was a ball that if had found the foot of an Aggie player, would have been a goal.
Blair Quinn: Yeah, that was definitely something we stressed-- starting fast and not putting ourselves in a position like we had the past several games where we were a goal and fighting back. Even though it was still 0-0 we really carried a lot of the play in the first half. We out-shot them something like 8-3, I think it was 5-0 in corners, we played well. It was one of our most complete games of the year in terms of 90 minutes good soccer.

bc.net: Defense. With Jessica Schutter in goal, you held them scoreless, they had come into the match averaging 2.6 goals per game in WAC games. You also held them without a corner kick which was the first time that the Aggies have done that in conference play in any of the three seasons.
BQ: That was good. Our back line, again they played really well. It was probably the best games in terms of consistency for 90 minutes but on top of that our mids defended really well. That was absolutely our best game from our midfield and that takes a lot of pressure off our back line and off our goal keeper. Jess played really well and our back line was great but our mids defended really well and that helps take a lot of pressure off of them.  Continue Reading This Post >>

bleedCrimson.net: Your thoughts on the weekend?
Blair Quinn: Two very very high intensity games, very challenging games. The first one Friday night was a bit of an emotional roller coaster. We ended up losing on a penalty kick in literally the last second of double overtime. It was unfortunate because I thought we played well enough to get points out of that game. We battled back again, another overtime game for us. Down a goal, again, but we seem to be able to keep fighting back and tie games up which is good, we've just got to find a way to win one now.

bc.net: Coming off the emotional loss against San Jose State, your kids were able to bounce back, it was a Sunday game and that's something you've been working on all season is trying to get them to much better on the second game of the week.
BQ: Yeah, that's always a challenge, playing as well on Sunday or better on Sunday than you did on Friday, especially that environment. Fresno has not lost at home all year and that was their last home game. As a matter of fact, their only other tie this year at home was against Pepperdine who is No. 4 in the country right now. That was a really good result for us in sense that it was on the road. Any time you look at a tie you can always say, "Well, we missed this chance or that chance and we should have won." But they also had a couple of great chances that they either missed or our goal keeper, Erin Wosick, made two really great saves in about a two or three second span in about the last minute or minute and a half of the second overtime. That game could have gone either way as well and in the end, that is a really good result getting that tie at Fresno State where they just don't typically lose at home and almost always win.  Continue Reading This Post >>