Aug. 20, 2015
Game Notes | Ambrose Interview | Granados Interview | Tillman Interview
NASHVILLE, Tenn.  A new era officially begins Friday.
Darren Ambrose has been on campus for more than six months, but he’ll make his Vanderbilt coaching debut on Friday when the Commodores open the 2015 season against Miami-Ohio. The game will start at 7 p.m. at the VU Soccer/Lacrosse Complex. As is the case for all home games, admission is free but the game will also be aired on SEC Network +.
Ambrose takes over at Vanderbilt after 15 years as head coach at Penn. He was the all-time winningest coach in program history with 148 wins. He also guided the Quakers to three NCAA Tournaments, three Ivy League championships, while never having a losing season.
The 44-year-old from England has inherited 15 letterwinners from last year, including eight starters, to go along with six freshmen and two transfers. Ambrose and the Commodores enter the season with optimism as they begin the season against Miami-Ohio and then head to Cincinnati for their first road test at 12 p.m. on Sunday.
“It is nervous excitement  you just can’t wait to see your team play,” Ambrose said. “You want to see how much they’ve taken in, what they’ve retained, how they apply themselves. That is the reward for coaching  seeing kids achieve things that they didn’t know they could do or that they set out to do. It is just a test. It is just an opportunity to see where we are. But, yeah, I can’t wait for 7 o’clock (Friday) night.”
GLIMPSE OF THE ‘DORES
Vanderbilt begins its 29th women’s soccer season this Friday against Miami-Ohio at the VU Soccer Complex.
The Commodores return 15 letterwinners and eight starters from a team that went 7-10-2 overall and 2-7-2 in SEC play. Among those returning are All-SEC junior forward Simone Charley, who led the team with nine goals last year, and midfielder Lydia Simmons, who was named SEC All-Freshman. Goalkeeper Christiana Ogunsami also returns after starting all 19 games as a freshman and leading the SEC with 113 saves.
In addition to Ogunsami, senior captain Erin Myers, senior Kelsey Tillman and junior Claire Anderson started all 19 games in 2014. Myers, a midfielder/defender, has started all 58 games of her career.
The Commodores return 56 percent of last year’s goal scorers. Both goalkeepers are back, as Ogunsami and senior Shannon Morrish combined for six shutouts.
The squad welcomes eight newcomers. Six freshmen arrive, plus a pair of transfers from the ACC  defender Danae O’Halloran from North Carolina and midfielder Kacy Scarpa, who played for national champ Florida State.
SCOUTING THE COMPETITION
The Commodores open the 2015 season with a pair of games this weekend versus two teams from the Buckeye State. They kickstart the fall at home against Miami-Ohio on Friday, and then hit the road to play Cincinnati on Sunday.
Miami-Ohio is coming off a 14-3-2 season and finished second in the Mid-American Conference with a 8-2-1 mark in league play. The Redhawks were picked to win the MAC Tournament in a preseason coaches poll. They return nine starters, including Second-Team All-MAC midfielder Haley Walter (two goals, four assists) and MAC All-Freshman pair Maggie Scott (four goals, two assists) and Kat Zalar (six goals). This will be Vanderbilt’s first match against Miami-Ohio.
Cincinnati went 10-8-2 last year, with a 4-5 mark in the American Athletic Conference. The Bearcats hold a 4-3 edge over Vanderbilt in the all-time series, but the Commodores won the most recent series  a 3-2 come-from-behind victory in overtime last year.
The Bearcats return 16 letterwinners from 2014 and are led by top returning scorer Danielle Rotheram (seven goals, five assists). They will be without All-AAC Second Team selection Katy Couperus, who suffered a season-ending injury this summer.
AMBROSE ERA BEGINS
Darren Ambrose begins his first year at Vanderbilt as the sixth head coach in program history. He spent the last 15 years as head coach at Penn, where he was the winningest coach in program history with 148 wins. He also guided the Quakers to three NCAA Tournaments, three Ivy League championships, while never having a losing season.
The 44-year-old from England has been a coach for the last 20 years, serving on staffs as Florida State, Connecticut and Rhodes College. He is no stranger to Tennessee as he received his master’s degree from Memphis, starting his coaching career at Rhodes College and was active in youth soccer in Memphis, leading the Memphis FC ’81 girls team to a state title and the Dana Cup championship in Denmark in 1998.
DOUBLE THREAT
Simone Charley enters the second half of what has so far been a superb two-sport college career. The 5-foot-8 forward from Hoover, Ala., leads active VU players with 14 career goals, including a team-high nine last year.
She accounted for seven of the team’s nine goals in league play and scored six goals in her last six games. She was named First Team All-SEC and All-South Region Second Team last year.
She showed glimpses of continuing her excellence with two goals in the team’s exhibition game against Alabama last week.
Charley also is a standout on the track as a three-time All-American. After finishing ninth in the triple jump as a freshman at the NCAA Outdoor Championships, she outdid herself as a sophomore. She placed fourth at the NCAA Indoor Championships and then reached the podium at the NCAA Outdoor Championships with a third-place finish in June. In the process, she leapt 44-3.25, breaking her own school record.
The double major in psychology and sociology was also part of a group of 10 Vanderbilt student-athletes who went to Cuba in July on an international service trip with Soles4Souls.
TASTING THE WORLD CUP
The Commodores were represented at the Women’s World Cup in June in Canada.
Redshirt junior Lina Granados made the 23-player roster for Colombia and traveled with the team during its four games. Colombia advanced out of pool play for the first time and fell to the United States, the eventual champ.
Granados hails from Ashburn, Va., but has dual citizenship as she was born in Bogota, Colombia. She has played for the Colombia Football Federation since she was 15, and has played in international tournaments three times. She helped the Colombia U-20 team win gold at the 2013 Bolivian Games in Peru.
OGUNSAMI BACK IN NET
Christiana Ogunsami returns in goal after a promising freshman campaign.
The 5-foot-11keeper from Cherry Hill, N.J., started all 19 games in 2014. She made113 saves last year to lead the SEC and record the second-most stops in a single season in program history.
She also tied the school record with 15 saves against No. 10 Texas A&M on Oct. 10. It was the most saves by a Vanderbilt keeper since Christy Barringer made 15 stops on Oct. 17, 1992.
Ogunsami spent the summer trying to fine-tune her game by working at The Keeper Institute in New Jersey with former U.S. Women’s National Team goalie Jillian Loyden.
MORRISH BEGINS NURSING SCHOOL
Senior goalkeeper Shannon Morrish will be juggling not only soccer and her final year of undergraduate studies this fall but also nursing school.
Morrish, a native of Bradenton, Fla., entered Vanderbilt University’s School of Nursing this week. She is pursuing a master’s degree in adult/gerontology acute care. She’ll be a registered nurse after the first year and complete the requirements to be certified as a nurse practitioner by May 2017.
SEC PRESEASON PLAYERS TO WATCH
Five Vanderbilt players were selected as preseason players to watch by the SEC.
Junior forward Simone Charley (nine goals, three assists), redshirt sophomore midfielder Lydia Simmons (three assists), sophomore defender Cristina De Zeeuw (one assist), senior midfielder Erin Myers (one goal) and sophomore forward/midfielder Sasha Gray (one goal, one assist) were all chosen.
EXHIBITION RECAP
Vanderbilt lost 4-3 to SEC foe Alabama in an exhibition game on Aug. 13.
The Commodores twice rallied from one-goal deficits. Simone Charley scored twice, Lina Granados added a goal and Sasha Gray and Kacy Scarpa each had assists. The Crimson Tide scored the game-winner in the 80th minute on a penalty kick.
