Before the team met for the first home game of the season on Thursday, Head Coach Brooke Lincoln gave me a preview of the 2024 APU women’s soccer season.
As she goes into her fifth season coaching the Azusa Pacific Women’s soccer team, Head Coach Brooke Lincoln settles into the new season hoping for changes and fulfilled goals. But before the packed schedule began, over the offseason, the women’s team took a trip to Colombia where they served in different neighborhoods and created a community with the children through the game of soccer.
When asked about how the trip went overall, Coach said “Amazing. [It was] one of those trips where there probably aren’t enough words to really describe or help people grasp how good of a trip it was. We had just a phenomenal time being able to serve together and play games together.”
While on their 10-day trip to Colombia, three people decided to be baptized and one player made a decision to follow Jesus. As the coach told me this, her eyes lit up with joy saying “That was the reason that we went. The playing was just a second thing but to allow the girls the opportunity to have a personal encounter with the Lord and just some time away from everything…”
While most teams are awaiting training, our girls got a chance to get ahead of the game and get 10 days of training before leaving for Columbia and an additional 10 days of playing while in Colombia. Lincoln explained that the NCAA rules only let teams go on a playing tour once every four years and this was the first time APU got a chance to participate.
“They took this time to be able to start working on tactics early, to be able to start working on some chemistry on and off the field early,” said Lincoln. “When players showed up for training camp it was already like the season had started back in July. This was just us kind of rejoining and getting together again, it didn’t feel like it was the start of something brand new.”
The “start of something brand new” is the case for some players as the team acquired 13 new athletes since the spring term. Lincoln calls the new recruits “fantastic.”
“They have just been tremendous fits, they have helped us take a step forward and who we want to be as a team and what we want to be as a program: positive, hard-working. They have a little bit of what we call a dog mentality about them,” said Lincoln.
There are a few names that stick out from the new bunch. One of these names includes Julia Galdamez, who Lincoln called “a 10 for us that transferred and we expect to be a really nice player for us.”
Lincoln also mentioned Zoey Kuhn who’s a player who came over in the spring and according to Lincoln she’s a player with “a very high IQ, [who] sees the game really well.” Then there’s Faith Crouse, the transfer forward from CBU. “We expect to do big things for us this year. A special player [who is] able to get herself to go and score some goals for us so we’re excited about her,” said Lincoln
Neyda Martinez, another Division-1 Grad transfer who plays in the midfield: “That’s just going to bring a lot of maturity and experience.” Lincoln says she brings great wisdom and IQ to the field as an extension of the coaching staff.
From the returning roster, Coach recognizes seniors Maddie Williams, a senior goalkeeper; Gianna Ocello, a starting center back for the team her entire career as well as Hailey Hilton, who originally was in the midfield last year and transitioned into the center back this year. Another player mentioned was Jaci Maze, who tore her ACL twice at APU and is recognized as one of the most resilient people Coach Lincoln knows.
Finally, Avery Guiel, a junior who scored in five of the last six games last year. Though it may have taken most of the season to score, she’s picked up right where she left off in the first two games where she scored three goals and had an assist last weekend. “We expect her to carry out another good one for us this year.”
Last season, the women’s team went 8-4-6. One of the biggest things the team is looking to change is being scored on in the last five minutes of the game, which led to either a draw or losing a match. “For us this year, bringing that number down we’ve got a goal for ourselves of 0.7 goals per game so less than one goal game average,” said Lincoln.
Coach Lincoln says she’s a coach with an attacking mindset. “I love to score goals and I think that’s something that is just going to continue as long as I’m here. We want to be a fun team to watch, we want people to come to our games and enjoy coming to watch and enjoy the product that we put on the field…soccer doesn’t have a lot of goals scored so whenever that happens it’s fun to celebrate and you want people to know APU can score goals.”
While we are three games into the season, Lincoln says she is most looking forward to being with this specific group of girls who “genuinely want to be about God first.”
“They are probably the most competitive group that I’ve had for sure, the grittiest group that I’ve had and they’re just a joy to be around. From my coaching perspective, our seasons are only three months long you know, we spend 260-something days waiting for the season to roll around and when it’s here it’s easy to miss if you’re always looking for what’s next. For me, what I’m most looking forward to is just getting to be with this team this season. This team will never be the same but after spending 10 days with this team in Colombia, I knew right away that there was something really unique about this team we haven’t had at APU in the past and so just getting to be with them for these next three months is what I’m really excited about.”
Come out and support the women’s Soccer team at their next home game on Tuesday, Sept. 17th at 7 pm in the Cougar Soccer Complex!