Ohio’s disappointing season won’t prevent the program’s long term success.
Ohio coach Aaron Rodgers spent Sunday night posting clips to Twitter of soccer programs celebrating their conference titles — only his team wasn’t a part of it.
Instead, the second-year coach was offering motivation to his squad, which failed to qualify for the Mid-American Conference Tournament for the first time since 2008.
“We want that to be us,” sophomore defender Mollie Whitacre said. “We see how much fun everyone else is having, and we’re here watching that. I think it’s motivation for us to want that next year, but at the same time it sucks.”
The Bobcats (6-13, 3-8 MAC) endured a season full of blows, from losing their captain in a career-ending injury to an attacking presence that was more of a hopeful vision than reality.
Oftentimes it seemed as if everything that could go wrong did go wrong as Ohio closed the season with a six-game losing streak, knocking itself out of postseason contention.
But now, that’s the past.
It’s been nearly two weeks since the season’s final whistle, yet preparation for the 2015 campaign is already in progress.
Though the players have every reason to be pessimistic, they are full of optimism.
Although the squad failed to make the conference tournament, that hasn’t stopped — and shouldn’t stop — the Bobcats from thinking toward the future and a conference title in 2015.
Buffalo, a team that missed the tournament altogether in 2013, finished this season 16-2-3 and won the MAC Championship. That kind of turnaround is exactly what Rodgers and his team would like to see in Athens.
“With soccer in the MAC, it’s who wants to come out and win,” sophomore forward Alexis Milesky said. “We’ve reflected on the season and have looked at what the problems are.”
Milesky also recalled Ohio’s 1-0 double-overtime loss to Buffalo on Sept. 28 as a perfect example of the season in one game. Despite the loss, the Bobcats controlled possession for a majority of the match but failed to produce a game-winning goal.
“Reflecting on that, there are little changes we have to make, and we started that yesterday,” Milesky said. “Even with the energy coming out yesterday, I think this season is going to be good.”
Of course a lot will change between Monday’s first day of offseason training and the first fixture in August, but the mentality going forward is that the program is on the rise.
After the NCAA Tournament seeding was announced, Rodgers tweeted once more that “One day we will be excited at this moment!”
For Ohio, that day might be closer than this 2014 season indicated. Milesky believes it’s going to take dedication, leadership and for everyone to buy into this process of getting to a championship.
“We focus now with that season in the past,” Whitacre said. “We focus on this season to make it better and I think we’re all excited to see what we can do.”
@charliehatch_
gh181212@ohio.edu
