After making it to the American Rivers Conference (ARC) championship last year, Simpson College Women’s Soccer began this season with a four-game winning streak, the best start since 1990.
The streak came with nine goals, including a hat trick by star forward Cassie Nash in the home opener. It also saw midfielder Julia Wagoner earn ARC defensive player of the week after scoring the only goal in Simpson’s third game of the season.
The streak was broken on Sept. 11 by the Milwaukee School of Engineering, but Simpson was quick to reestablish itself with a 2-0 victory over Grinnell on Sept. 14.
Head Coach Jeremy Reinert said that he was excited to learn that it was their best open in over 30 years, but hopes going forward they can make the record even harder to beat.
“We have a lot of really good pieces,” he said. “We’re capable of winning in a lot of different ways.”
Those pieces include Nash and Wagoner, as well as forwards Brissa Valdez and Averi Baas, who helped Simpson win its first game of the season.
Baas has already scored three goals as a freshman while still recovering from a torn ACL and meniscus.
“I was very anxious to get back to playing,” Baas said, but she was also excited to be a part of a team that was already breaking records.
But Reinert was quick to note that it’s not just the scorers who make the team so special.
“The sophomore class is the unsung heroes of the group,” he said. “Those girls have done a really great job of filling our group out.”
Reinert also pointed to midfielder Haley Kowzan as a player the team typically depends on in the midfield. Kowzan was similarly pleased to begin the season 4-0 and expected it to make the team play harder going forward.
“We’re creating a target on our back,” she said. “That pushes us to continue fighting for our spot.”
Kowzan and Reinert anticipate fighting harder as they get deeper into the season, especially once they begin conference play.
“You have all these games to ultimately play your best soccer at the end of October into November when it’s the NCAA tournament,” Kowzan said.
One major challenge the team anticipates is their rematch against Loras College, who denied Simpson the ARC Championship title last year.
“Ever since we lost to Loras, I’ve wanted to play them again,” Kowzan said. While she didn’t say Simpson could definitely beat Loras, she expressed confidence in herself and her teammates’ ability to win.
“We want our shot at them,” Reinert said. “It’s closer than the scoreline shows from a year ago, but that one’s been circled for a while.”
Baas expressed a similar sentiment of anticipating the rematch with Loras, but also said that she was focusing on the upcoming games more.
Reinert hopes the coming seasons will continue to be legendary, even as headliners like Nash graduate.
“The standard isn’t set to change after Cash [Cassie Nash] graduates,” he said. “The goal is to be good every year.”
