Six games into the season, the men’s soccer team is still searching for its first win. The News sat down with forward Avery Schwartz ’16, who has played in five games for Yale so far, to discuss why the Elis’ record does not match their level of play.
Q. The team has yet to get its first win, but in watching the games, it is easy to see there is still a lot of good soccer being played out there. How would you assess the team’s performance so far?
A. I think the team’s performance has been decent so far. We have not been getting the results we want, but our play has improved as the season has progressed, and we are in good shape moving on towards Ivy play.
Q. What in general does the team need to improve on and what does the offense need to do better to start putting away its chances?
A. The team has improved in each game, and we need to continue to keep improving. As long as we do that we are going to be a very dangerous team to play against. We have done a good job of creating chances, and as long as we continue to do that the goals will come.
Q. How has incorporating the new players into the team’s systems been so far? Has the constant reshuffling of lineups been a hindrance to the team’s play?
A. The new players have done a fantastic job adapting to the the challenges of college soccer. They have picked up our style of play quickly and have done a great job having a positive impact on the team. The changing lineups has allowed a lot go guys to get experience. This is going to be really important later on in the season as we are going to need a lot of guys to be playing well for us to compete to win the Ivy League.
Q. What new player have you been impressed with the most?
A. I think there have been a lot of new guys who have come in and played really well.
Q. What can you make of the goalkeeper competition between Ryan Simpson ’17 and Blake Brown ’15? Is it nice to know that you have two capable keepers or hard not really knowing which one is truly the starter?
A. I think it is great that we have two really talented keepers on the roster. I feel confident when either one of them is in the net, and I think that the competition just makes both of them better players.
Q. There are only two more games before the start of the Ivy League slate. How different or difficult for the team is the second half of the season when compared to the first half? Are you nervous to start the campaign against Harvard?
A. Whether we are in the first or second half of the season, we obviously want to win every game. However, there is something special about Ivy games. Right now we are totally focused on the game against Quinnipiac tomorrow, and we won’t start to think about Harvard until after our game against Fairleigh Dickinson next Tuesday. With that said, at the start of our season our main goal was to win the Ivy League, and the path for that goal doesn’t really begin until we play Harvard in Cambridge on Oct. 4.