Albany State women’s soccer ready to make history

ALBANY — The Albany State women’s soccer team learned its fair share of hard lessons during the program’s inaugural season, but this year the team and head coach Alex Pickrell believe everything has prepared them to make this a successful season.

The first step in doing that is getting the program’s first win in school history. After finishing 0-13 last year, Pickrell her squad came back hungry and determined to turn last year’s lessons into this year’s victories.

“There’s a drive to win. We want to get that first win under our belts,” she said. “The girls are itching for a win. We’re approaching a scrimmage and looking to see what we’ve got, but we’re driven to get that first win and after that I think the fire will be lit.”

As last season progressed, the Rams went from giving up about six goals a game to giving up two and coming within one goal in their final match against Auburn-Montgomery.

“As the season went on, we bonded more as a team and you could tell that our chemistry got better,” senior midfielder Jenna Wade said. “We were able to connect more off the field, and that helped with connecting on the field.

The Rams brought all 11 players back and saw two more freshmen and two junior college transfers join the team, as well as former Darton State College and Deerfield-Windsor standout Hayley Kincheloe. Pickrell said she was able to work more with the players individually this offseason and really focus on specific areas of improvement. She believes the combined experience of the team will make a difference.

“We had an entire team full of players who had never played Division II soccer,” she said. “They were all junior college players, all freshmen, all brand new to Division II. It’s just getting that experience over time, unfortunately it took us playing so many games to get there. But over time we got better and started playing at that level.”

With the necessary talent and experience in place, it’s up to the Rams to stand and deliver.

“We know what the other teams are capable of so it’s up to us to just step up and play aggressive, play better and get the win,” senior forward Laura Valcourt said.

The goal for the Rams is to get thier footing this season so when they join the Peach Belt Conference next year as an associate member, they’ll be able to hit the ground running.

Albany State will start the season off Aug. 31 at Valdosta State.