It is not easy to play women’s soccer in the same conference as North Carolina—the team that has won 15 conference tournaments and 18 national championships over the past 23 years—but for the 18th-ranked Duke women’s soccer team, earning the respect they feel they deserve might be more important than winning the league.
“We always kind of get the shaft in the rankings,” midfielder Casey McCluskey said. “We don’t really know why we never get much credit but we always end up upsetting people.”
After a 14-7-1 campaign in 2003, the Blue Devils, lead by co-captains McCluskey and Carolyn Ford, are ranked fifth in the ACC despite the fact that they return nine of their 11 starters.
“We were picked to finish in the middle of the pack in the preseason. We’re a little disappointed,” head coach Robbie Church said. “I think we have a lot to prove out there.”
Junior forward Carolyn Riggs headed an attack that posted 48 goals last season, the most since 1995, but Duke expects its scoring output to increase even more in 2004 because of its depth at the attack and midfield positions.
“We’re probably going to be a team that gets a lot of scoring from different people,” Church said. “You won’t see the one person that’s going to score goals every game with us, but I do see five or six players with close to double figures. That’s a great way to play.”
McCluskey, one of the team’s three seniors, is coming off a year in which her scoring slightly decreased but her offensive production hardly declined, thanks to what Church believes is greatly improved passing.
Joining McCluskey at the talented midfield position will be freshman standout Lorraine Quinn. A Farmingdale, N.Y., native, Quinn has played for several youth U.S. National Teams and was the 2003 Gatorade New York State player of the year.
“We’re most excited about Lorraine Quinn,” McCluskey said of the freshman players. “She’s a midfield player, she’s really creative. She likes to get the ball and score goals and do tricky, creative things.”
Ford will anchor a defense that remains intact from the team that made it to the second round of the NCAA Tournament. Third-team All-American Kate Seibert, who spent part of her spring alongside McCluskey at the Under-21 National Team training camp, will also be a member of a defense that could ultimately decide the success of the 2004 Blue Devils.
With the graduation of All-American goalkeeper Thora Helgadottir, the biggest question surrounding Duke is how the defense will perform as a unit with a new netminder behind them. Senior Katie Straka and freshman Ali Lipsher, who won player of the year honors in Hawaii, are battling for the starting spots.
Morale and unity among the players is high, and as Church enters his fourth year at the helm, he is thrilled to be coaching the most experienced team he’s had during his time in Durham.
“It’s different because we’re a little bit more of a veteran team than in the past,” Church said. “Two years ago we started six freshmen, last year we started up to four freshmen, this year we will probably have two play a lot as freshman. So it’s really more of a veteran group and that’s exciting.”
The team is primed for another strong season challenging within the ACC, and although they are still heavy underdogs to their counterparts in Chapel Hill, Church and the Blue Devils have no problem competing with the best.
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