In Girls' Soccer, It's Broad Run

By B.J. Koubaroulis

Saturday, March 21, 2009

Broad Run Coach Claire Collins won't answer the question. Instead, she talks about her soccer team's lofty goals for the season.

Returning first team All-Mets Holly King and Caitlin Hunter skirt the question, too.

"I don't think we've ever really thought about it that way," Hunter said.

With 16 returning players from a 24-0 Virginia AA state champion team, five of them bound for major Division I college soccer programs, many area soccer fans, coaches and players have started to ask, "Is this the best Broad Run team ever?"

"We're probably the most competitive team that I've ever been with," King said before catching herself, perhaps for letting too much slip. "I think, I mean, we just take every game one game at a time."

Maybe the players don't want to seem overconfident, but no one within the program was willing to say that this Broad Run squad is the program's most talented. The numbers, however, speak for themselves.

In the past seven years, Collins has recorded more than 100 victories and turned Broad Run into an area soccer power, taking the Ashburn school to the state tournament in four of the past five years.

The Spartans have also dominated the Dulles District, in which they have not lost since dropping a game to Loudoun County in May 2007.

Since 2006, Broad Run has had an arsenal of talent that has posted 43 shutouts and outscored its opponents 312-42.

But with all its history and success, last year's 24-0 run to the program's second state championship was not a culmination. It was perhaps a starting point for Broad Run, which returns a talent pool deeper than that of any other area squad.

The Spartans return an All-Met goalkeeper in Hunter, a University of North Carolina at Wilmington-bound senior who had 30 shutouts in the past two seasons.

King, an All-Met midfielder who has scored 44 goals and 25 assists in her career, is a Florida recruit who is widely regarded as the area's best field organizer. She is the returning AA state player of the year.

Senior forward Kelly Evans scored 31 of her 66 career goals last season and will play at Old Dominion next year.

Valerie Powell is an Arkansas-bound forward who managed 16 goals and 17 assists even though she was a secondary scoring option last season.

Taylor Starr is a senior defender who will play at Tusculum College in Tennessee.

Jenny Taylor, Brenna Smith and Ellie Zoepfl each recorded goals and assists in last year's state championship run, and their roles should expand this season.

The most telling sign of Broad Run's depth, however, is that it has a national pool player who is not even the centerpiece of the team.

Although most programs would shape their attack around Whitney Church, an under-17 women's national team pool player, at Broad Run, the talented sophomore center midfielder is just another weapon.

Broad Run is vying to become the first Virginia AA team to win consecutive titles.

"I think it's something new for the team to have our minds set on, rather than thinking, 'Well, we've already done it once; there's not as much importance in doing it again,' " Hunter said. "I think that definitely motivates us."

Last week, Broad Run defeated area power and crosstown soccer rival Stone Bridge, 2-1, and the Spartans also won their season-opener against Battlefield, 2-1. Battlefield is the returning Virginia AAA state runner-up.

"We played both of our out-of-district games before the [Dulles District regular season] started, and I think that's like a first for us," said Collins, who usually schedules her tougher out-of-conference games closer to the postseason. "It just worked out that way, and it kind of gave us an idea of how good we're going to be. This group, they are so ready for competition. They all know that they have a target on their back already because they know that someone wants to be the first to beat Broad Run."

Tagged: Broad Run High School, high school sports, soccer

Your Thoughts...

Are you happy that the school year is over?