Irish need win over Hoosiers to keep top regional ranking
By MIKE CONNOLLY
Associate Sports Editor
The No. 6 Notre Dame women's soccer team (14-3) travels to Bloomington, Ind., Sunday to take on the Indiana Hoosiers (5-9-3).
While Indiana is neither a strong team nor a conference rival, a win over the Hoosiers is very important to the Irish post-season seedings.
Indiana is part of the NCAA Great Lakes region along with Notre Dame, Kentucky, Michigan and other area schools.
Currently the Irish are in first place in the region but a slip up against the Hoosiers could hurt Notre Dame's seeding in the NCAA tournament.
"I think certainly in our region to be the high seed is very important," head coach Randy Waldrum said. "We hope that we would be one of the top four seeds so we can host tournament games up through the final four. So I think it is very important to win out. That only enhances our chances."
While the Irish stand sixth in the polls behind Santa Clara, North Carolina, Nebraska, Florida and Penn State, the seedings for the tournament are not based on the polls.
Instead a committee uses such factors as strength of schedule and head-to-head results
to determine the seedings. The higher a team's seed, the more likely it will host a tournament game. The top four seeds are guaranteed to host tournament games up through the quarterfinals.
Waldrum believes that Notre Dame's difficult schedule will help the Irish gain a top-four seeding.
"We feel like our strength of schedule is better than Florida's," he said. "We think its better than Penn State's. We think its comparable if not better than Nebraska's so I think there is still a possibility that we can still get one of those top four seeds."
Playing in the Big East tournament will also help the Irish cause. Notre Dame will probably face strong teams such as Syracuse, Seton Hall and Connecticut. Wins over those three teams would greatly improve Notre Dame's strength of schedule.
Before the postseason begins, however, the Irish still have to correct some defensive problems.
While Waldrum could find little to complain about his team's offense that scored nine goals against Wisconsin, he was not pleased with mental lapses that led to the Badgers scoring two goals less than one minute after the Irish scored a goal.
"I was very concerned about that," he said. "That is one of the things that we have to get better at. The kind of goals that we were giving up weren't really goals that they created so much against us as they were mistakes that we made.
"We have to find a way to stop making mental mistakes," he continued. "That's going to hurt us in the big games if we aren't careful. It seems like we have been giving up a lot of those through out the season. We're just losing our concentration for a minute or two. As things get tougher, we can't afford to do that."
With tougher games just around the corner, Waldrum hopes to get out to a big lead against the Hoosiers so that he can rest his players for the post-season.
"It is certainly a game that we are hoping to get some players some rest," he said. "Last night fortunately we were able to get some players some rest in the Wisconsin game in the last 15 or 20 minutes. Hopefully we can do the same against Indiana."
All Sports Stories for Friday, October 29, 1999
