Prior to the start of the season, coach George Tarantini said the two non-conference games at the beginning of the year would be important to gauge the quality of the team, given the strength of the ACC.
Well, after knocking off St. Francis 1-0 Saturday at Method Road Stadium and losing to Hartford 2-0 Sunday, Tarantini attempted to answer questions about the quality of his team.
“That’s a fair question,” Tarantini said. “But right now it’s inconclusive. I keep saying that I’m pretty optimistic, but this is very hard because you need to be prepared to do a good job, and we were.”
A question mark was next to the goalkeeper position at the start of the season — losing second team All-ACC performer Jorge Gonzalez to graduation and having to replace him with someone with no experience.
Throughout the preseason it was a two-man competition for the starting job between redshirt freshman Chris Widman and junior transfer Tom DeStefano. As late as Wednesday, there was no starting goal keeper, according to Tarantini.
Yet over the weekend there was no controversy or splitting time. Widman started both games and played all 180 minutes in goal. He allowed just the two goals Sunday, one of which deflected off an N.C. State player into the goal, and he had four saves in the two games.
“The goalkeeper did a very good job,” Tarantini said. “The two goals they scored — I don’t think you can fault the goalkeeper. He did very well.”
Tarantini added Widman had earned the starting role and would remain in goal for the next game.
Aside from goalkeeping, forward play and finding playmakers to score was also a concern before the season. After managing only the one goal over two games, it may still be, but Widman is confident it will not be a long-term problem.
“It’ll come. It’ll come,” Widman said. “There’s no question that we have great players on the top. It’ll come.”
One guy missing from the lineup is sophomore Ronnie Bouemboue, an ACC All-Rookie team player a year ago, and the second leading returning scorer from last year. Tarantini said he recently had surgery of some kind, but did not say what type or when he expected him to return.
Tarantini did say when Bouemboue does return, his services would be appreciated and that “he’s a good guy [and] my score guy.”
He quickly added, though, he would not use Bouemboue’s injury as an excuse for the loss to Hartford or any offensive woes the team might have.
“No excuses,” Tarantini said. “We know what we did here today. We have to do a better job. The coaches have to do a better job. Everybody has to do a better job.”
The Pack next plays nationally ranked South Florida on Friday and American Sunday at the Duke/Adidas Classic in Durham.
As far as what the team learned about itself in the opening weekend of the season, Widman said it still needs plenty of practice.
“We had a good day Saturday and a tough one today,” Widman said. “What we can gauge from the weekend is that we got a lot of work to do.”
