Women’s Soccer Heads Into Tournament Play

Kelly Williamson, one of the 13 freshmen of Kean’s women’s soccer team.

By Gerald Lima

The Kean women’s soccer team holds a record of 10-6-2, including a six-game winning streak at the beginning of the season.

“We take advantage of each training session and use it as an opportunity to work hard,” said freshmen forward Gabrielle Cucinotta. “Everyone individually is improving themselves to better the team as a whole.”

The Cougars are currently the defending, back-to-back ECAC champions, but they still look for more each and every time they get on the field.

“The atmosphere as a whole is different,” Cucinotta said. “This season we have set our goals high and with the guidance from our coach and seniors, our goals seem reachable.”

The Cougars went 4-4-1 in NJAC conference play, and recently came up short in the first round of the NJAC tournament. They lost a tough 1-0 contest against Rowan University. K.C Nunez, the Cougar’s goalkeeper recorded a season-high thirteen saves in the loss.

Despite that setback, the Cougars are still looking to defend their ECAC title in the upcoming tournament.

The Cougars abide by its slogan “You don’t get what you wish for, you get what you work for,” as they keeping working hard to reach their goals.

“We pretty much honor the saying,” said Cucinotta. “We know we have hard competition on our schedule, but our coach has full confidence that some games we will win solely from our effort, if our skills are not enough.”

The Cougars have 13 freshmen on the team, which makes up almost half of the roster this season.

“Team chemistry is our big focus this year,” said Cucinotta. “Our coach has drilled it into us that team chemistry is the most important thing needed to be successful. With the new freshmen this season, we are definitely focusing on becoming one as a team.”

With the season winding down, and their last few games ahead of them, the Cougars are looking to finish strong, both offensively and defensively.

“Our common goal this year is consistency,”said Cucinotta. “We chose this as our one common goal because consistency is a key factor to being successful, if we don’t stay consistent we will accomplish nothing.”

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