The ISU soccer team said conditioning would be key to solving the team’s lackluster performance in Sunday games. Conditioning was still an issue as the Cyclones fell to Pittsburgh in their first Sunday game of the year.

“We came out so flat against Pittsburgh last week, and when we watched film, you could see the difference between the [Illinois] game and [the Pittsburgh] game,” said senior Erin Curry.

After watching film of the Pittsburgh game, the team knew they had to go back to the practice field and work. That work paid off last weekend, when the Cyclones defeated UNI on Sunday.

A constant Cyclone attack in the first half led to 10 shots, but none of the shots found the back of the net.

“The first half [against UNI], we played hard but missed many opportunities,” said senior Leslie Hill.

Iowa State kept the pressure on the Panthers in the second half, eventually breaking through for two goals.

The Panthers’ offense was stifled by the Cyclone defense only getting off five shots in the game.

The progress the Cyclones made over the week on both sides of the ball was apparent to coach Wendy Dillinger, as the team applied pressure throughout the whole game.

“The style of defense we played helped to eliminate the quick goals that we had given up in the first Sunday game,” Dillinger said. “When we looked at the game film from the Pittsburgh game, [Pittsburgh] got behind us a lot, and we knew if we wanted to succeed, we would have to fix that.”

Dillinger said practice has helped the team in understanding how to run the style of offense that keeps the tempo high.

“It’s not just practice and conditioning anymore,” Curry said. “We have created competition in practice that only helps us when the games come around.”

Despite the improvement shown over the weekend, Dillinger said the team needs to continue working on playing with a high level of intensity.

“It’s nice to beat a couple of teams that you really should beat, but there are many things that we all need to work on if we want to keep moving forward,” Dillinger said. “Getting the first win is always tough, and now that we have got that, it’s time to progress and play at that level every game.”

With all of the injuries to the team this year, the lack of subs force players to be fit enough to play for an entire game, but Curry thinks the team is up to the challenge.

“Playing together and knowing what we have to do just makes us better each day,” Curry said.