It's been an eventful start to the season for the Virginia women's soccer team.
The Cavaliers have recorded three wins in three games, thanks to an offense that has hit the net eight times and a defense that has refused to return the favor to other teams. Despite the early signs of success, Virginia's offensive stats are misleading, considering six of those goals were scored against Rhode Island alone. Virginia has struggled in its last two games, squeaking by James Madison and West Virginia with a slim one-goal advantage.
The No. 4 Cavaliers may not have the luxury of playing below their best when they travel to University Park, Pa. to face Penn State Sunday. The Nittany Lions, ranked No. 8, will be Virginia's first big hurdle of the new season.
"It's a big game, a huge game," senior midfielder Kelly Hammond said. "We're really looking forward to it. It should be a good test."
Virginia coach Steve Swanson is under no illusions about the threat posed by the Nittany Lions.
"For us, obviously, Penn State's a difficult team, and we're playing them away from home," Swanson said. "We have to be ready for that one. That's going to be a difficult game. It's a great challenge for us. I think it's something we need to see where we are, and I think our kids will be ready."
Penn State is enjoying a great start to the season with wins over No. 9 Connecticut and No. 20 Washington and is riding the boots of senior forward Tiffany Weimer. Weimer, just named the Big Ten offensive player of the week, has four goals in only two games this season, including a hat trick against Washington.
Despite their offensive prowess, the Nittany Lions have allowed three goals, which should be an encouraging sign for Virginia's offense, which is yet to fully click. The trick for the Cavaliers has been trying to find the right balance between aggressive attack and possession soccer.
"I think we had to do a little bit better," Swanson said after his team's win over JMU. "I thought times when we needed to switch [sides of the field], we looked to penetrate, and times when we needed to penetrate, we looked to possess."
For Virginia to be successful, the much-talked about offense will have to find the form it showed during the first game of the season -- when six different players were on target -- and get an early breakthrough. The Cavaliers will hope to avoid Wednesday's scenario, when it took 83 minutes of play for them to finally score, despite the fact that they dominated the game and had a clear advantage in speed. In spite of Virginia's early season struggles, Swanson said he believes his team is improving.
"I think our team's going to get better and better," Swanson said. "We just need to get back to the training table."
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