BATON ROUGE – While competing with one of the more youthful rosters in the Southeastern Conference during the 2010 season, the LSU soccer team saw their run of three-straight SEC Western Division championships and three-straight NCAA Tournament appearances come to an end with an 8-8-5 overall record and 4-4-3 mark for a sixth-place finish in the final league standings. That performance also earned the Tigers a second-place finish in the SEC West.
A league-high seven freshmen cracked LSU’s starting lineup during the 2010 season following the departure of a heralded senior class that earned 50 wins in the four previous seasons from 2006-09. It was a senior class that also finished runner-up to Florida for the SEC regular season championship in back-to-back seasons in 2008 and 2009.
Despite their youth, the Tigers advanced to the SEC Tournament semifinal for the fourth-straight season before falling in a penalty kick shootout to the 16th-ranked and No. 2-seeded South Carolina Gamecocks. LSU and Florida are the only two programs in the conference to appear in the SEC Tournament semifinal in each of the last four seasons.
After playing some of their best soccer of the season at the end of the 2010 campaign, the Tigers carried their momentum into the 2011 spring season while lining up against many of the nation’s premier programs in a challenging six-game slate.
The Tigers wrapped up the spring campaign with a 3-2-1 overall mark, highlighted by the 1-0 shutout of the Texas Longhorns in Houston on March 26. LSU also played to within one goal of two teams that earned a place in the NCAA Elite Eight during the 2010 NCAA Women’s Soccer Tournament in Florida State and Oklahoma State. LSU opened the spring suffering a 1-0 defeat to the Cowgirls before wrapping up the campaign with another 1-0 defeat at the hands of the Seminoles on April 9.
In fact, LSU’s lineup in its spring finale against the College Cup veteran Florida State Seminoles featured five freshmen, including Addie Eggleston on the front line, Jodi Calloway, Shannon McLain and Alex Ramsey on the back line and Megan Kinneman in goal.
“Our program really took a big step forward in the spring while competing against some of the elite programs in our sport,” said LSU head coach Brian Lee. “Florida State, Oklahoma State and Texas are three Top 20 programs and College Cup contenders year in and year out. We certainly showed that we’re right there in that mix. That experience will pay big dividends for our team as we prepare for another championship run this fall.
“It was also a very important spring for our freshman class as they made that transition to their sophomore season. They just continue to make great strides in our program. It’s been easy to see the individual development of many of our players as they’ve continued to mature throughout our offseason program. The work they have put into fitness is evident.”
The pieces are certainly in place for the Tigers to challenge the likes of Florida and South Carolina for this year’s SEC championship as their most notable weakness from a year ago is sure to be a strength this fall with 10 starters returning to form an experienced unit with an eye on SEC supremacy. In fact, LSU features 15 players on its 2011 roster with starting experience.
LSU returns nearly all of its offensive output from the 2010 season as 23 of 25 goals and 71 of 78 points scored last fall are sure to kick start the attack this fall.
Senior midfielder Natalie Martineau and junior striker Carlie Banks make their return as LSU’s leading goal scorers from a season ago with five goals apiece for the 2010 campaign. Eggleston is sure to join the attack as an All-SEC candidate on the front line following a rookie season last year when she scored three goals and a team-leading eight assists and 14 points.
Redshirt freshman Kaley Blades is also anxious for her return to the lineup in the wake of a 2010 season cut short by injury after only four games when she suffered a torn ACL in her knee against the Virginia Tech Hokies on Sept. 5. Blades was the team’s leading goal scorer at the time of her injury with two goals and one assist for five points in four matches.
The future of the LSU defense was certainly on display this spring as Kinneman anchored the unit in goal following a freshman campaign in 2010 in which she was named to the SEC All-Freshman Team as one of the nation’s top young goalkeepers. She pitched six shutouts in 14 starts last year, while setting an LSU single-season record with a 0.66 goals against average.
Calloway, McLain and Ramsey joined senior leader Kellie Murphy along the back line in the spring. Calloway and Murphy held down the middle with McLain earning the start at right back and Ramsey playing left back for the Tigers. LSU’s defense proved to be one of the best in the SEC a season ago while allowing just 16 goals to its opponents in 21 matches in 2010.
The emergence of Calloway as a defensive leader this spring allowed Taryne Boudreau to make her return to the midfield as she is poised for a stellar senior season in 2011. Boudreau, who started all 21 games as a center back last fall, is more naturally suited for a spot in the midfield with her ability to score goals and distribute the ball to her teammates in the attacking third.
Boudreau has strengthened a midfield unit that also features two other Canadians in Martineau and senior All-SEC performer Allysha Chapman. Chapman is fresh off a 2010 season in which she earned her second career All-SEC honor with a first-team selection, while Martineau ended the season as the team’s leading goal scorer with five goals in her first season at LSU.
“Having Jodi Calloway back from injury is a huge addition to our program,” Lee said. “What she’s really done with her emergence on the back line is allow us to become an even more dangerous team in the final third in creating and scoring goals. Having Taryne Boudreau up in the attack is tremendous in our ability to create those opportunities. We’re certainly much more dangerous now than we were last season.”
The Tigers will kick off the 2011 campaign with an early-season road test against the four-time defending Conference USA Tournament champion Memphis Tigers on Friday, Aug. 19, at 7 p.m. CDT as both sides collide at the Mike Rose Soccer Complex in their season opener.
In order to prepare for a run at the SEC championship, the Tigers will compete against an impressive non-conference schedule that features five other teams that ended the 2010 season with a final RPI among the Top 100 teams in the country. This includes home fixtures against the likes of Oklahoma, Oregon and Pepperdine, as well as road matches with Houston and Rice. Both Memphis and Oklahoma earned a berth into the NCAA Tournament a season ago.
The Tigers will then compete against an SEC schedule that features three matches against NCAA Tournament teams from a year ago. Highlighting LSU’s home slate in 2011 is an Oct. 20 derby against South Carolina. The Tigers are also set to go on the road to battle the five-time defending SEC champion Florida Gators and defending SEC West champion Auburn Tigers in a pair of challenging matches.
There’s no question that the LSU soccer program has firmly established itself among the nation’s elite with its performance during the last four seasons and the Tigers are hungry for more as the 2011 season draws near. When Lee took over the program in December 2004, he committed himself to “build a program that annually contends for the SEC, qualifies for the NCAA College Cup and competes to win a national championship.” With LSU’s performance for the past six seasons, his goals are now well within reach for a new generation of Tigers.