by Will Stafford, Associate Sports Information Director
BATON ROUGE -- After being selected as a No. 4 national seed and one of 16 regional host sites for the first and second rounds of the NCAA Tournament on Monday evening, LSU soccer coach Brian Lee met with members of the media on Tuesday at Walk-On’s Bistreaux to discuss his team’s postseason bid.
The Tigers (14-4-4) have received an at-large bid into the NCAA Tournament for the third-straight season and will play host to the first two rounds for the first time in program history.
No. 4 seed LSU will take on Arkansas-Pine Bluff in the first round on Friday at 7 p.m. at the LSU Soccer Complex. Friday’s action also features a first-round match between Texas A&M and Memphis at 4 p.m.
Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased online at LSUsports.net. Orders will be available for pickup at Will Call as all seats at the LSU Soccer Complex are general admission.
Fans have the opportunity to purchase an All-Session Ticket for admission to all three games of the Baton Rouge Regional, including two first-round matches on Friday and one second-round match on Sunday. All-Session Tickets are $10 for adults, $5 for students and $5 each with a group purchase of 10 or more.
Tickets for individual sessions are $6 for adults, $3 for students, $3 with a group purchase of 10 tickets or more and just $1 for youths ages 5 and under. Tickets for Session 1 are valid for both first-round matches on Friday, while tickets for Session 2 are valid only for Sunday’s second-round match.
Fans can also purchase tickets during business hours in person at the LSU Ticket Office or over the phone at 225-578-2184 or toll free at 1-800-960-8587.
Comments from Head Coach Brian Lee
Opening Statement ...
“To recap where we have been the last couple weeks, we just finished the SEC Tournament. We had an extended stay in Orange Beach, where we reached the final. To get there, we beat Vanderbilt in the first round, 4-2, and Auburn in the second round, 1-0. We then faced South Carolina in the final and played a very good first half and then our legs gave out on us in the second half. It looked like we were going to hold on and stay organized defensively and get a 1-0 victory, but they scored in the 88th minute. The overtime we had one great chance to score when Melissa Clarke, one of our All-SEC and All-American candidates, broke through on the right and South Carolina’s goalkeeper made a great save to keep the game alive. It went to penalty kicks and got all the way to the ninth round and we ended up on the short end of it.
“Big picture, it was a great experience and another great step forward for the program. To come that close over the course of our first recruiting class’s four years with us, we feel good about it. The penalty kick shootout, it was great to get some experience with it. We always practice it, but when you do it at practice with nobody watch it and no pressure it is not realistic. For the kids to have lived through it, win or lose, and especially getting all the way to nine shooters, we feel that is a big benefit going into the NCAA Tournament because in all likelihood there is a good chance that happens again.
“Going forward, last night we were ecstatic to get a national seed. We are very excited to play at home. In our sport, we are very dependent on the teams in a 400 mile radius of us to do well as well to get a chance to host. Once we pick the seeds, it becomes very regionalized and luckily we had teams within driving distance make it as well and our team had done well enough over the course of the year and in the RPI to give us that opportunity. Now it’s up to our kids, coaches and staff to take advantage of that opportunity. It leads off with Arkansas-Pine Bluff on Friday night. They are the SWAC champions and have won 10 of their last 11. They have a very young team full of freshmen and sophomores and a bunch of international kids, so we are going to have a big challenge Friday night. On the other side of the bracket, there is Texas A&M and Memphis. We have great respect for both programs and have two of the best coaching staffs in the country.
“Certainly it is going to be great weekend of soccer over at the LSU Soccer Complex. We encourage everyone to come out. The tickets are cheap and available online. You can get group, individual or child tickets. Hopefully, big picture for us, playing at home means a one goal advantage. If our fans turn out again, we have a great chance to advance Friday night and then again on Sunday. The Tiger nation plays a big role for us, so we invite everyone to come and we will see where this leads heading into next week.”
On how the loss in the SEC Tournament final affected LSU’s seeding ...
“Maybe one spot. The score goes down as a tie in the RPI stuff, and with soccer, we stick pretty close to the RPI when it comes to seeding. We may have moved up to a No. 3 seed. We were probably pretty close because I think our actual RPI was around 12 so we could have been a No. 3, but we feel comfortable where we are at. We like the bracket both small picture and big picture. Most importantly, no matter who we are playing, we have excellent players with experience and it is a senior-laden team. If we show up to play and our intensity is top-level and we attack, we have a great chance for success against anyone.”
On the team’s experience in the NCAA Tournament ...
“A couple years ago we made our first appearance and played a very tough Samford team. A lot of times when you are a bigger program, you are going to have the run of the play over the course of the game. At this point in the year everyone is used to winning and everyone has had success, so even the smaller schools can be difficult to break down and that is what we saw that night. Eventually we got a goal to win that one 1-0 in overtime. We then ran into Florida State who ended up making in to the Final Four and we were played off the park in that year.
“Then last year, we didn’t get a seed which left us traveling to Texas A&M, and with the regionalization of the tournament it’s a good chance that either us or Texas A&M is going to get the higher seed and host. We drew a bad matchup with the geography of it. We played really well for the first 75 minutes up 2-0 and cruising. Melissa Clarke went down with an injury and we weren’t able to recover from that and ended up losing 3-2 in overtime to Washington. Washington was another team that had a successful team last year and we were the only two Top 25 teams playing each other in the first round so it was just a geography-based thing. They had to go somewhere and we were unlucky enough to see them in first round and one of us had to go home. This year we have done the work to be at home, and hopefully the players and the coaches can turn that into wins on the weekend.”
On how Malorie Rutledge has progressed this season ...
“She has gotten better again. It is really amazing with her. As a freshman, she was a two goal, four assist player. She had a hard time playing 78 minutes from a fitness and strength standpoint. She doubled that as a sophomore and then doubled that again as a junior. Once she reached that point, that is a lot to ask and really not realistic to double it. She has gone from a big assist player who pitched in with a few goals to now she is a 10-10 player with 10 or 12 goals and 10 or 12 assists. She has really balanced out her game and she is as much of a scorer as she is a provider with assists and crosses. I feel she has taken another big step and much better than last year. Hopefully, she is a legitimate Hermann Trophy candidate.”
