Ambika Singh | Lariat Photographer
By Daniel Wallace
Sports Writer
Coming off a historically successful weekend for Baylor soccer, the team looks to repeat its recent victories. This past weekend, the Bears surged past two Big 12 teams, Kansas and Iowa State, both on the road. This weekend the Bears will face Missouri at 7 p.m. Friday at home and will play host again for Jackson State at 1 p.m. Sunday.
“I think the team has a lot of momentum going into this weekend,” Big 12 offensive player of the week and junior midfielder Lisa Sliwinski said. “Winning two games in the Big 12 period is difficult to do back to back; doing it on the road is a feat. It’s definitely a milestone in our season. It’s experience to draw from.”
Although the team is excited about the two victories this past weekend, it is fully focused on the task at hand. That task is the Missouri Tigers. Head coach Marci Jobson said Missouri is a very fast, athletic team who is good at scoring goals. She said she will not change her coaching strategy or practice in order to prepare for Missouri. She said she believes that at this point in the season, it is necessary to just hone in on the aspects of the game that the team excels at.
“Momentum is great but tomorrow is tomorrow,” Jobson said. “Today is today. We have a new game Friday. We’ve got to prepare and just do what we’ve been doing all year. Missouri is a very good team; we’ve not beaten them in a long time.”
The last time Baylor beat Missouri was on the road in Columbia, Mo. on Oct. 1, 2006. Jobson said that a lot of what the team does in practice is training its own system and making sure it keeps getting better.
“I’m not a results-based coach,” she said. “I really believe when you concentrate on how you compete, good things will happen. When you start concentrating on the results of how you compete, you forget how to compete; you forget what you need to do. I don’t want to forget what we need to do.”
Junior midfielder Hanna Gilmore said that Missouri is at the forefront of all players’ minds.
“Missouri is just an all-around good team,” she said. “It’s going to be a battle. They are really skillful. They always bring fight; they are hard-nosed, hard-working.”
Senior goalkeeper Courtney Seelhorst, who was named the Big 12 Defensive Player of the Week on Tuesday, will lead Baylor on the defensive side of the ball. Seelhorst allowed just one goal over the past weekend while making seven saves. In 15 starts, she has only allowed eight goals and has a Big 12 leading nine shutouts this season.
