NASHVILLE, Tenn. — In eight of the past 12 months, Vanderbilt has been on the pitch playing competitive soccer.
The COVID-19 pandemic presented the Commodores with a schedule unlike any they had played in their history. It included 12 contests last fall followed by five more in the spring.
There was also a run to an SEC championship in November that secured a trip to the NCAA Tournament in May.
“Right when we came back it felt like we never left. But it’s definitely a new energy,” Vandy senior midfielder Raegan Kelley said. “It’s good to just to be in a normal schedule and have Thursday-Sunday games and not have to be practicing six days a week.
“And it’s fun trying to figure out what the theme of this year is going to be. We’re still working through that right now.”
Kelley is part of a corps of veterans charged with coaxing along a group of highly-talented yet equally inexperienced newcomers – newcomers to the program and to the concept of increased playing time. There are nine freshmen, eight sophomores and Arizona transfer Ava Hetzel learning on the fly as the Dores look to defend their 2020 league tournament title.
Picked to finish fourth in the SEC and ranked 18th nationally, Vanderbilt will make its 2021 debut at 7 p.m. Thursday when it welcomes Tennessee Tech.
“Are we on the right track? Absolutely. Where we were a week ago to where we’re at today is night and day,” Vanderbilt head coach Darren Ambrose said. “I do think our upperclassmen have started to reassert themselves and have more confidence in what we do. The younger kids are seeing that and are able to mimic what they’re seeing.”
Ambrose, in his seventh season, has turned the Commodores into a perennial contender for SEC crowns and into a mainstay at the NCAA Tournament. It was only eight months ago that Ambrose watched his 2020 team win four matches in seven days to capture the program’s first SEC Tournament championship since 1994.
Kelley, Maddie Elwell, Madiya Harriott, Ella Shamburger, Kimya Raietparvar, Maya Antoine, Alex Kerr and Abi Brighton are just a few of the notable players returning from that championship run. Keepers Kate Devine and Sophie Guilmette are back as well.
Ambrose said while he is hoping for the emergence of more vocal leadership inside the locker room, he has observed and listened to his upperclassmen help mold the younger players throughout the preseason.
“We’ve had two weeks now and there have may have been one or practices where the physical effort wasn’t great. Ninety percent of the time they work really hard,” Ambrose said. “We’re now trying to translate that into working a little smarter than we are harder. That’s the information piece. They’re willing. We just have to try to get them to slow down enough and be a bit more efficient in what they’re doing.”
Vandy included two exhibition matches in its preseason buildup. It beat Chattanooga 2-0 on the strength of a Sophia Gorski brace but then dropped a 1-0 decision at Memphis.
Ambrose and Brighton both agreed that the latter result served as a necessary wake-up call to allow the Dores a better understanding of where they are and where they need to go in order to compete at the highest level.
“We’re trying to figure out what form we’re going to play best in,” Brighton said of the Memphis result. “It was good because we have to be able to figure out that one form doesn’t work better for us. Now we know which style we’re going to play, we know what to expect. I think for a lot of us it was like, ‘Hey, we need to pick it up just a little bit more – the competitiveness, the physicality, the speed of play.’
“It gave everybody a chance to figure out what it’s like before we get into SEC play.”
Thursday’s match will be the first of eight nonconference affairs for the Commodores leading into the always-challenging SEC slate. Six of those contests will be at home with road tests coming Aug. 26 at Western Kentucky and Sept. 9 at Lipscomb.
The Southeastern Conference Tournaments is scheduled to begin Oct. 31. To prepare for that part of the schedule Ambrose said he just wants his side to focus on getting better by the day and concentrating on how to improve each workout, each training session, each practice and each game.
If they do that, the Commodores will be right there at the end.
“We’re just now starting to see in moments what they really can do. When they first come in they’re spinning and they’re just trying to stay in practice and be there and work really hard,” Ambrose said. “Now they know this is the speed we play at, this is the expectation and why I do this. Now you’re starting to see them catch on to an idea, a tactical piece, a physical piece. The only thing you can hope is the moments continue to grow and they become more moments.
Right now it’s just about keeping one foot in front of the other and taking their knocks in practice and taking the advice that they’re getting. Hopefully that will lead to improvement. It’s baby steps with this group at the moment.”
— Chad Bishop covers Vanderbilt for VUCommodores.com.
Follow him @MrChadBishop.