Since I last spoke to you we’ve played three more games against ranked ACC teams: Duke, North Carolina and Virginia, and lost all three. I felt like we played the same game three times in a row.
It was so frustrating. Either we started off the first five minutes awfully and got strong, or started strong and got worse. We weren’t playing like we were in practice. We were playing as individuals and were not clicking.
It’s tough knowing we have so much talent and how well we can play, not being able to perform the way we are capable. We could play with all four teams except Maryland, and it is tough not putting up a fight when you know you have one in you.
It’s kind of hard to pinpoint what the problem is. We all talk a lot about what we need to do but none of us are actually doing it.
I’ve started all four games and I was really happy with the way I played the first two games. I went out with the mentality that there was nothing to lose. After losing those games I started playing timid and it all went downhill from there.
My problem is all mental. If I get scared or nervous or make a mistake my brain shuts down and I get tense and I have to learn to improve on that. Being a Division I athlete you need to know how to move on and take criticism and not lose confidence. I need to be a little tougher mentally.
After playing four ACC teams and knowing how well we can play and how we could have beaten them, I think it will definitely help us playing teams in our conference. If we can keep up with the four or five top-ranked teams in the country, we can play with the teams in our conference. We just need to be confident and kick butt.
Our coach feels this is a learning experience and wants us to take a lot out of this.
I’m confident I will learn and hopefully improve not getting down on myself when I make a mistake and my coach will hopefully recognize that.
We’ve lost four games in the past two weeks and we may have lost four games during my entire career at Darien. Coming from a high school where there is enormous pressure put on you to be undefeated, it’s a lot different. It’s really hard dealing with losing when you are not used to it. I am a very competitive person so I don’t like losing to begin with.
We are really looking forward to proving ourselves in our first conference game and showing what we are made of. We play American next week.
Hopefully I’ll have some good news to report!
