Q: A weird day to start off with a two-hour delay for kickoff. Wet. Soggy. What are your takeaways from today?
Radwanski: Well, it ended up being a good night to play. It was nice and cool. As a soccer player, you like to play when it’s a little bit wet. Look, we played a very good team today, and I thought we played quite well in the first half. I was just disappointed that we conceded the goal. As a young group, we have to work on how we come out after halftime. We can’t concede a goal early — and we did — and that changes the momentum of the game. That’s one of the harsh lessons you get from playing in a game like this. Games like this stink to lose, but you’ve got to get better. You’ve got to make it count.
Q: That first opportunity you had in the first half didn’t quite get put away. What do you need to do to capitalize on those early chances and build momentum in games like this?
Radwanski: You have to create your own luck, your own momentum. You get these chances, and you have to take advantage of them. Lately, we haven’t really been creating chances — or at least not as many as I’d like. We need to be a little more intentional. We have to take some risks. Our attacking players need to take responsibility and threaten the goal. Look, we didn’t win the game, but we’ll learn from it, and we’re going to move on and get better.
Q: Juju Harris wasn’t out there today. She’s been a pretty stable force up front for you. How did you feel the rest of your forwards stepped up?
Radwanski: They went out there and worked hard. There were some moments where we needed to be a little cleaner. Look, when someone’s not playing and others are out there, that’s their opportunity to step up. We were looking for them to bring a strong work ethic — and they did. They’ll learn from this game.
Q: You head into another ranked matchup against Notre Dame on Sunday. Was the message to the team, “Hey, take this as a learning experience going into Sunday”?
Radwanski: Oh yeah, that was basically the message. Look, one thing doesn’t change — you have to play a game on Sunday, whether we won this one, drew it, or lost it. We still have another game to play, so we have to get ready for it. We didn’t get the result today, okay? You can mourn for a few hours, but when tomorrow hits, you’ve got to start focusing on Sunday.
