MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Never has West Virginia’s women’s soccer program been without the guidance of Nikki Izzo-Brown. Yet for all her experience, Izzo-Brown, who enters her 26th season as head coach of a program that began competition in 1996, does so in uncharted territory.
West Virginia begins its season at 5 p.m. Thursday against Buffalo at Dick Dlesk Soccer Stadium only three and a half months after it fell to Rice 1-0 in a second-round NCAA Tournament match after earning an opening-round bye as the No. 5 overall seed.
“As much as I hated Covid and still do, and it’s done so many awful things to our world, I got to train them forever in the fall — that I loved,” Izzo-Brown said. “We’re never ready in my mind, because there’s always more to teach, learn and do. All of a sudden, three days and we’re playing. Man I hope it’s rocking, because we’re kicking off.”
The Mountaineers played a nine-game, Big 12-only schedule last fall and finished 7-2. Because of the pandemic, the NCAA opted to postpone the NCAA Tournament until the spring. WVU then played four more regular season matches in March and April, before the setback to Rice left Izzo-Brown’s team with a 10-3-1 finish.
“We were very dissatisfied, because we didn’t think we played our best when we needed to,” Izzo-Brown said. “We are definitely excited to redeem ourselves and hopefully not have a regret like that again.”
To help deal with a short offseason and quick turnaround, Izzo-Brown felt it was imperative for returning players to step away from the game for a period of time.
“We were very mindful of that and really kind of giving the team a big chunk of time off,” she said. “Of course the load, volume and intensity was a little different in spring, so it was always a concern. But our strength coach Josh Feldkamp and our staff really wanted to make sure that we took care of the athlete, especially in May, and kind of worked with those concepts going into camp.”
The Mountaineers sport a more experienced roster this season — one that lists six seniors among 32 players, as opposed to one senior last season on a team comprised of 23 players. However, that senior — midfielder Stefany Ferrer-vanGinkel — leaves a major void to be filled in the midfield. Ferrer-vanGinkel led West Virginia with 15 points after tallying six goals and three assists.
“You’re going to see Julie Lynch really stepping it up,” Izzo-Brown said. “Lilly McCarthy is coming back. We definitely are really excited about Maya McCutcheon, who’s a transfer from Oklahoma. Between the three, they’re definitely going to give us what we’re going to lack losing [Ferrer-vanGinkel]. All three are really working hard.”
Senior forwards Alina Stahl and Lauren Segalla return after leading the Mountaineers with six goals and five assists, respectively, last season.
Junior Kayza Massey saw the bulk of the action at goalkeeper and finished with a 0.88 goals-against average and .640 save percentage over 10 games. Massey returns between the posts, as does senior Maddie Murphy, a Boston College transfer who played in WVU’s four other matches.
“Life as we know it is about experiences, especially when I can refer to games and different opportunities where we’ve been really successful or failed as a team,” Izzo-Brown said. “By having Jordan [Brewster], [Stahl], [Segalla] and the Grace Smiths of the world, we can really pinpoint certain things and say, ‘this is what we can do and this is what we can’t do.’
“Two years ago, this was a real big rebuilding team and now they’re not. They’re experienced, so they have to make sure they understand what that means. It’s a privilege now and we have to put those pieces together for success.”
As opposed to last season, West Virginia, which already faced Maryland and North Carolina State in exhibition matches, plays its non-conference schedule early. WVU’s first nine contests are against non-league opponents, while the second half of its slate is nine matchups with Big 12 foes.
The matchup with Buffalo marks the first home sporting event with full capacity for WVU since the start of the pandemic.
“I’m excited. The team is even more excited,” Izzo-Brown said. “They are so happy to get in that stadium and compete and make the fans proud and make sure they’re doing everything they can to be successful Thursday night. They’re so excited to get back out and do that, because it was always limited last spring. Hopefully we’ll fill up and people will come out and support us.”
The Mountaineers have made 21 straight appearances in the NCAA Tournament, while Izzo-Brown brings a career mark of 362-122-56 at WVU into this season.
The veteran coach has a relatively simple approach for how her program can continue that success moving forward.
“We have to be organized, we have to be vocal,” she said, “and we have to outwork anybody else in the country.”