Women’s soccer club carves their own path
Cheering on your favorite college sports teams stings a little when you wish it was you on the field.
For many young athletes, organized athletics ends after they graduate high school. As students pack their bags and move into their dorms for the first time, those who did not receive an athletic scholarship may be wondering how they can keep playing the sport they love.
Soccer-loving students joined together in 2019 to cre- ate a women’s club soccer team, providing an opportuni- ty for Aggies who were not a part of the university team to continue playing the sport they loved.
The club almost immediately ran into challenges.
“We started in 2019, and then COVID came in and basically tore us to nothing,” said head coach Xander Hayden. “We had a big section of time where we weren’t active at all, and now we are starting our third full year this year, so we’re pretty new.”
Hayden, who is also a current student at Utah State, was not the original head coach when the club was formed, but jumped at the chance to become involved with the program.
“My friend Haley said, ‘We just fired our old coach because he wasn’t working for us. You should coach,’ and I thought it was a joke,” Hayden said. “She was like, ‘No, I’m for real.’ I was like, ‘Oh, if you think I would do a good job, tell me what to do and I’ll figure it out.’”
Unlike other scholarship sports at USU, club teams are student-run and individually funded. Each team buys their own jerseys and equipment, schedule, their own games and pays for their own travel. With so many logistics and a relatively young club, making sure every necessary action is taken can be difficult to manage.
“One of the struggles we’ve seen is just having access to information and resources we had previously,” Hayden said. “Trying to regain information from the past generation, if you will, of those that ordered jerseys that knew who to talk to for refs and how to schedule games was a little bit lost in that process. It’s been difficult to find out for ourselves, so we had to just essentially start over.”
Despite the high level of turnover the team has seen since its inception in 2019, Hayden and the players are excited to continue to build a club team that can be competitive.
“We’ve made significant progress skill-wise and commitment-wise,” Hayden said. “In the past few years, we’ve gone from losing games 8-0 to being fully competitive and tying, and hopefully beating teams this season.”
Senior Ashton Snarr joined the club during the 2022 spring semester and is beginning her first year serving as club president. During her involvement with the program, she’s already seen a lot of growth occur.
“I came to the second day of tryouts and there were like 11 girls there — like nobody was there, so that sea- son we played maybe one game,” Snarr recalled. “This year, we had like 50 girls come tryout, which was really awesome. So it’s growing, which is good.”
After seeing the internal club infrastructure decimated after the start of the pandemic, ensuring the club has the proper pieces in place to remain strong has shaped how club leadership has approached trying to rebuild the club.
“My vision for our club has just been growth and creating a club that will last and isn’t going to go away if COVID happens again,” Snarr said. “I want this to be an opportunity for years to come for girls who want to play soccer.”
Having an opportunity to play in an organized and competitive league is something all club sports, including women’s soccer, provide Utah State students. Despite sacrificing money and time to participate on the team, for Snarr, the cost is well worth it.
“I choose to keep playing because I’m not ready to be done with soccer yet, and it’s honestly just a great way
to meet people and to make friends in college,” Snarr said. “Our club is $150 and you get to travel to Salt Lake, Orem and Boise. We get to go all over and still play soccer. It’s just — it’s incredible.”
A key difference between the women’s soccer club team and other scholarship teams at the university is the time commitment. Making sure players have a healthy balance in their lives is a priority for Hayden.
“We have the empathy and understanding that we’re all students, we have other commitments and to be lenient enough to provide you a normal life outside of soccer,” Hayden said. “But when you’re at soccer, you’re taking this as seriously as anyone else could. Having that balance while having fun and having a very positive environment is something we very much value.”
USU fell to the University of Utah 3-0 but bounced back to beat Montana State University 2-1 in their second match of the season. Regardless of the win-loss record the team has at the end of the season, both Snarr and Hayden hope this year serves as a building block to continue to create a sustainable club while growing their recognition around campus.
“We want our team to be successful because that boosts morale and that gets people out to games. We want to get those wins and we want to just grow our club name,” Snarr said. “We want people to come support us. We want it to be like lacrosse and rugby, which it’s not right now, but that’s okay. There is room for improvement for sure.”
“We haven’t been around long enough for people to know who we are,” Hayden said. “People know the hockey team, they know the men’s club team — so among the other clubs, we’re definitely lower on the radar compared to our peers.”
The Aggies will look to sweep the season series against Montana State on Sept. 29 at Legacy Fields. For more information about the women’s club soccer team visit usu.edu/campusrec/competitive-sports/club-sports/ womens-soccer.