In her fifth and final season at Drexel, Annalena O’Reilly is coming in clutch

Annalena O’Reilly has a habit of scoring game-winning goals.

Two of her four goals for Drexel women’s soccer through the first six games of 2023 season were game-winners, securing the Dragons’ victories against UMBC and St. Joseph’s. The fifth-year midfielder already is approaching her 2022 season total of three game-winners, tied for the third-most in the Coastal (formerly Colonial) Athletic Association.

“I think it just is, I really want to win. I’m super competitive,” O’Reilly said. “So it’s just that extra push.”

Helped by O’Reilly’s clutch performances, the Dragons are off to a 4-2-0 start to the season, winning all three of their home matches. It isn’t quite the 10-game unbeaten streak that started off 2022 season and set a program record, but each of Drexel’s wins have been dominant. Goalkeepers Molly Piso and Joella Chase have combined for four clean sheets.

The 3-0 win against St. Joe’s, in which O’Reilly scored the opening — and, ultimately, deciding — goal, was Drexel’s first time beating the Hawks.

“We just kind of learned to take one game at a time, not look too far ahead, and focus on what we’re capable of doing,” head coach Ray Goon said. “And we’re really confident with the players that we have here. So it’s pretty easy to have that good feeling snowball when we’re playing so well as a team.”

An Ardmore native, O’Reilly spent her high school career at Haverford. Athletics run in the family — O’Reilly’s father, Aidan, was a runner at Penn State.

“He inspires me a lot, and he obviously relates to a lot of the athlete things I go through, so it’s nice to have someone to play off of and get feedback from,” O’Reilly said.

It helps, too, to have his perspective when it comes to the endurance side of soccer.

“He likes to make me run,” she said.

O’Reilly’s seven goals in 2022 were tied for sixth-most in program history, and her performance earned her CAA Midfielder of the Year. Not even a third of the way into the 2023 season, and she’s already more than halfway to that total.

“It’s the competitiveness in practice, and we’re all supporting each other,” O’Reilly said. “I obviously don’t get the goals on my own; it’s the support of my teammates. [We’re] just pushing each other every day to be better.”

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This will mark O’Reilly’s fifth and final season in a Drexel uniform, after she first arrived on campus in 2019. In that time, Drexel only made the CAA postseason only once, in 2022.

“I definitely came in [with] not a lot of confidence, and having my teammates around me supporting me all the way through, and then my coaches always reassuring me helped a lot,” O’Reilly said. “I’ve been able to grow to a much more confident player, and even be able to spread that through my team. So yeah, it’s been awesome. I’ve been able to grow as a person as well.”

Last year, the Dragons beat William & Mary in the quarterfinals and were eliminated in the CAA tournament semifinals by Northeastern.

O’Reilly is in a five-year civil engineering program, so it only made sense to spend her final season of eligibility with the Dragons, since she would be on campus for the year anyway. Her first taste of the playoffs last year only added to her desire to return.

“We’re a family,” O’Reilly said. “I couldn’t do another year without them.”

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O’Reilly is steadily climbing the record books. Her goal in Drexel’s 2-1 loss to Quinnipiac on Friday was the 15th of her career, moving her into a tie for ninth in program history. O’Reilly will have some competition at the top from teammate Delaney Lappin, a senior forward whose 22 goals are tied for second all-time. The mark to beat is 25, held by Jenna Lindsay, who graduated in 2011.

The records are a nice bonus, but O’Reilly’s focus is on the team.

“We always talk about just playing to your abilities and not really setting any statistical marks to achieve,” Goon said. “It’s really just do what you’re capable of doing and help the team prepare its best.”

Playing professionally after college hasn’t been something she’s considered much yet, O’Reilly said. Her main goal is returning to the CAA playoffs.

“We really got a taste of it last year, but we didn’t quite get there,” O’Reilly said. “So I think it makes us even hungrier for this year.”

Drexel’s CAA slate kicks off Thursday, when the Dragons host William & Mary at Vidas Field (6 p.m., FloSports).