A unified approach has put women’s soccer at Drexel ahead of the ‘class’

When Annalena O’Reilly arrived at Drexel in 2019, she and her fellow freshmen on the women’s soccer team were tasked with taking care of the equipment. As the first-year players on the team, that was something they took on by themselves.

Fast forward four years, and O’Reilly, now a senior, is on equipment duty yet again.

However, this time, she’s joined by the entire team.

“Now, we do it so that everybody helps out with equipment every day,” said O’Reilly, a forward with five goals this season. “We rotate roles every day. So it’s definitely much more evenly spread out, and not one responsibility falls on one class so that they feel like a huge burden or responsibility just on themselves.”

This change began last season when head coach Ray Goon implemented something that some of his players refer to as “classism.” Ultimately, they say Goon’s meaning of classism is that every grade should be treated equally.

It’s a movement that has grown stronger in its second year and has helped improve the team culture. In turn, the team is off to its best start in program history with a 7-0-3 record as Colonial Athletic Association play is underway. Previously, the longest unbeaten start to the year for Drexel was three games.

Drexel was picked to finish eighth in a conference that now has 12 teams.

The Dragons are averaging 2.1 goals per game after 1.12 last year, and they’re giving up just 0.9 goals per game in 2022, compared to 1.35 a season ago. They already have 14 assists this season, after just nine in 17 games last year. They opened conference play with a 3-2 decision at Charleston and posted a 3-2 victory at UNC Wilmington, the preseason pick to win the CAA.

While this group of Dragons hasn’t seen a strong start like this before, they are no strangers to promising nonconference play. Last season, Drexel began its campaign with a 4-1-1 record and finished the nonconference slate at 4-3-1. But, their struggles in 2021 came in CAA play, when the Dragons went 2-5-2 and finished eighth. They ended the year with a 6-8-3 overall record.

That fast start and slow finish last season isn’t something that has been lost in the shuffle. Senior captain Lily Dunbar, who is one of many returning players, remembers CAA play and has learned from it.

“Just making sure that we understand even when bad times happen,” she said, “being able to bounce back from that quickly and not letting it affect the rest of the season or future games. [That] is something that has happened in past years that I think I’m more confident that won’t happen this year with the team that we have.”

With the team culture seemingly moving in the same direction as its remarkable record, Goon mentioned that he thinks the team is playing more consistently this year, and it’s doing a better job of taking care of the ball. He also said that Drexel has come through when there have been opportunities to capitalize, and is playing more team soccer.

Although the Dragons were above .500 after eight games last year, things have changed. Being undefeated, there’s certainly a target on their backs.

But they have one another to lean on, and so far that has worked out pretty well.

“Overall, this team is just much more connected and together,” O’Reilly said. “And we play for each other rather than just our own individual achievements, which is, I think, a huge thing that has helped us be successful this season. I think going into conference [play], we’re feeling good and have a lot of momentum.”