Florida opened its inaugural season in front of a sold-out home crowd Saturday. The team enjoyed the attention, the crowd and its 16-6 win over Jacksonville.
However, the time to enjoy that win is already over.
Less than 48 hours after the inaugural game, UF (1-0) traveled to Philadelphia on Monday for its second game of the season and first on the road — a matchup against La Salle on Tuesday.
The match was scheduled to begin 3 p.m., but due to snow on La Salle’s field, the time and location were changed to 12:30 p.m. at Temple.
UF coach Amanda O’Leary said the quick turnaround from competing on Saturday to Tuesday’s matchup is something her young team has to get used to because of its schedule.
She added it should be a positive because her players will not have time to dwell on previous game results.
“They’re going to have to learn quickly and make the adjustments quickly and be able to adapt to the next game we are playing,” O’Leary said. “We need to continue to do the things that are going to help us win games versus trying to come up with game plans for each and every team we play.”
O’Leary shows her team film and scouting reports to identify its opponent’s tendencies, but ultimately the challenge for the Gators is to make the necessary adjustments in the short time available.
Going up against La Salle on Tuesday, UF will look to avoid the fundamental mistakes that it made against Jacksonville. The team will have to clean up its passing and pay attention to fouls.
O’Leary said there was no excuse for having as many dropped passes as the squad had against Jacksonville, but the Gators should be able to play a clean game and keep possession of the ball Tuesday because they worked on those fundamentals every day in practice.
She added that Saturday’s game against the Dolphins highlighted some other things that her team will need to do in order to beat La Salle.
“Defensively, it showed that we have to communicate more,” she said. “We have to be able to play more as a defensive unit versus as seven individuals.”
Offensively, she said her players will need to have more composure on the field and better possession time.
Going into Pennsylvania, the Gators will have their work cut out for them, and they may have trouble implementing the changes O’Leary said they need to make.
Last week, La Salle senior Stefany McKee was named Player of the Week in the Atlantic 10 Conference. Sophomore Sara Ciaverelli was dubbed Defensive Player of the Week, and freshman Melanie Sarcinello was Rookie of the Week.
The Explorers lost their season-opener 12-11 to Navy on the road Feb. 12, but they had a week off to prepare for the Gators’ visit.
O’Leary said they are athletic, quick offensively and are fast to collapse to double teams on defense.
Subsequently, if UF wants to return to Gainesville 2-0, it must have a solid game on both ends of the field Tuesday.
