Playing at home with a full student body on campus for the first time this season, the Stanford women’s soccer team will look to impress tomorrow night when it takes on Hawaii. The No. 2 Cardinal (6-0-2) is riding a five-game winning streak and is coming off a tournament in Santa Clara in which it outscored its opponents 8-1 over two games.
As the Cardinal heads into its match with the Rainbow Wahine (2-7), no player has more recent momentum than Christen Press. The senior forward leads an offense that has outscored its opponents 21-7 over eight games by contributing a nearly nation-best total of 10 goals of her own, along with three assists. Most recently, Press had a five-goal weekend in the Santa Clara Classic that included a hat trick in the first 32 minutes of a 6-1 rout of Pacific. With her performance, Press earned recognition as both the Pac-10 Player of the Week and TopDrawerSoccer.com’s National Player of the Week.
The offense may be putting up big numbers, but the Stanford defense has also been turning heads in the early games of this season. The defense has allowed less than a goal per game, and in its last outing it shut out a Georgetown team that had been averaging 3.88 goals per game before last weekend.
“The defense is really strong right now,” said Stanford head coach Paul Ratcliffe. “Alina [Garciamendez], [Courtney] Verloo, Annie Case, Rachel Quon…we’ve had a lot of success with the back line, and we’re looking at different people in the back line.”
The newest member of the Cardinal defense is sophomore Courtney Verloo, who played in all 26 games last season primarily as a forward and made the Pac-10 All-Freshman team. The Tualatin, Ore., native, who scored her first goal along with a pair of assists in her debut against Hawaii in 2009, has started all eight games as a defender this season.
“Obviously it’s a complete 180 from forward, but I think our back line is awesome,” Verloo said. “I’m in between Rachel Quon and Alina Garciamendez. They’re just world-class players, and they’ve helped me a lot, helped me to adjust a lot. I think we’ve come together pretty quickly as a strong unit back there.”
Stanford has also displayed added flexibility at the goalkeeper position, with senior veteran Kira Maker sharing time with Emily Oliver, a freshman. Oliver has started two games for the Cardinal and has played nearly 300 minutes compared to Maker’s 445, and has posted a paltry .30 goals-against average.
“Emily’s been incredible, and she has a great presence in the goal,” Ratcliffe said. “And Kira’s still there knocking on the door–she’s an amazing goalkeeper and she’s had an amazing career at Stanford, so we’re still looking at her day-to-day, along with [backup goalkeepers] Lindsay Dickerson and Aly Gleason. They’re all talented keepers and we’re looking at them all the time.”
Hawaii, a team Stanford defeated 6-2 last season, hasn’t enjoyed the same solid start that the Cardinal has. The Rainbow Wahine hasn’t won since facing San Francisco on Sept. 3 and hasn’t scored a single goal since Sept. 5. In its last four games, it has been outscored 16-1.
Ratcliffe, never one to rest on his laurels (or his team’s), does not plan to take Hawaii lightly, however. Even with a big game against No. 3 Portland coming up this Saturday, the Stanford coach says he won’t make sacrifices to prepare for future games.
“My first goal is just that we have a good performance, and that we get a good result in the game,” Ratcliffe said. “And from there, depending on how the game goes, we’ll make adjustments. But you can’t take anyone lightly. I know the coach of Hawaii, [and] he’s a good coach with a lot [of good] players. I expect it to be a hard game.”
If the match proves to be hard-fought, Stanford may gain a slight edge by finally having a significant home crowd to back it up.
“It helps the team a lot–I think it motivates us to play our best,” Ratcliffe said. “Last year we had fantastic crowds, so we’re really excited to have people come out, and we’re going to put on the best performance that we can to excite the fans.”
Thursday’s match against Hawaii is scheduled for 7 p.m. at Laird Q. Cagan Stadium.