Women's Soccer | 8/14/2015 3:37:00 PM
Live Stats ABILENE – Abilene Christian's demanding 2015 season kicks off Saturday when the Wildcats visit the Baylor Bears for a 6 p.m. exhibition at Betty Lou Mays Soccer Field.
This is the first match between schools and ACU's third against a Big 12 opponent. The Wildcats lost to TCU and Texas Tech last fall, and this season they'll again face the Horned Frogs in Fort Worth before taking on the Texas Longhorns the weekend of Sept. 11-13.
Baylor, picked to finished eighth in the Big 12, finished 9-8-3 in 2014 and was 2-5-1 against the conference. The Bears return 15 players from last year's side including Second Team All-Big 12 selection Bri Campos (14 points) and sophomore Precious Akanyirige, who made the Big 12's All-Newcomer Team after scoring three times through 20 starts.
Baylor's roster this year also is stacked with 15 newcomers. Freshman Julie James scored the game-winner for the Bears Monday night in the 11th-minute of a 1-0 exhibition victory over Samford, while junior Jody Lee pitched a complete-game shutout behind three saves.
"We're treating this like a normal game week even with our two-a-day practices in full swing," said ninth-year head coach
Casey Wilson. "We're analyzing what we've done so far in camp. And moving forward we'll try and make the appropriate improvements and adjustments to see what still needs to be fixed."
The Wildcats have their biggest roster (29 student-athletes) in the program's nine-year history currently grinding through their second week of camp, which featured a 90-minute intrasquad last Saturday at the new Elmer Gray Stadium.
White defeated Purple, 5-2, led by sophomore
Baylee Mitchell's hat trick and two goals from junior
Natalie Throneberry. But apart from the offensive theatrics the fans also witnessed a hard-working and energetic group that relentlessly pushed itself through triple-digit temperatures before and after sunset.
Another unique trait of this year's team is the age diversity between the four classes as the inexperience of 10 freshmen is balanced out by three proficient seniors (
Lindsey Jones,
Nicci Nelson and
Rachel Shedd) and a combined 16 juniors and sophomores, the majority of which composed last year's starting lineup.
"There's a lot of experience on this team even among the newcomers with the two transfers (
Danielle Otto and Kilegh Vann) coming in to help," said Wilson. "They and the rest of the freshmen have really raised the bar for us to be more competitive and complete. The depth we have this year is incredible, and I plan to use that to our advantage."
Mitchell led the team in scoring as freshman with 14 points off the bench and will be joined up top by the likes of Jones, junior Throneberry and redshirt sophomore
Leslie Snider, who was a Southland Conference honorable mention and later selected as ACU's Comeback Student-Athlete of the Year award. Snider tallied eight points on three goals and two assists last season.
Additionally,
Chloe Fifer logged 759 minutes and made 13 starts at midfield as a freshman a year ago, scoring five points.
The biggest hole for the Wildcats to fill is the one left by former midfielder
Sarah Schoch who started all 19 matches in her senior year and ranked third on team with 1416 minutes played. Junior
Maria Gomez played the roles of holding and defensive midfielder this past year with both the Wildcats and Colombian National Team, making her a strong candidate for a starting job. Senior
Nicci Nelson also has been a center midfielder and stopper during her collegiate career, but last year was limited to 189 minutes because of injury. The season prior Nelson started 17 matches (1104 minutes) for the Wildcats after transferring to ACU from San Diego Mesa College.
Further back, the defensive line largely remains in tact and will be anchored by returners
Alyssa Gerner,
Kelsie Roberts and
Chantal Kinsey, while in goal the Wildcats added two freshmen (
Madeline Grimes and
Rachel Johnson) to apprentice under second-year starters
Kelsey Dombrowski and
Sydney Newton.
Dombrowski and Newton split time in goal throughout 2014, combining to post four shutouts and log the third-lowest goals-against average in the Southland Conference at 1.17. Dombrowski logged a 0.98 goals-against average during her sophomore season with 52 saves and a ,839 save percentage. Newton, meanwhile, ranked among the league's leaders with a 1.37 GAA, .797 save percentage and 4.25 saves per game (51).
Despite returning a flood of talented players, the Wildcats were picked to finish fifth this fall in a vote taken by the Southland Conference head coaches and sports information directors. ACU placed fourth last year at 5-4-2 (its second straight winning season vs. the league) with two of its victories coming against teams ranked ahead of them, Sam Houston State (W, 3-2) and Southeastern Louisiana (W, 2-1).
The Wildcats lost 1-0 last season to both the Southland favorite Stephen F. Austin, and its NCAA Championship qualifier Houston Baptist in overtime.
