Liberty women’s soccer has found a lot of success on the field this season with a 9-3-2 record so far. The Lady Flames are also undefeated in the ASUN with a 5-0-1 record and are currently in second of the standings.
Last season, Liberty went 11-7-1 and 6-3-0 in the conference but lost in the quarterfinals of the conference tournament but this season they’re finding success with a fairly young team. Of the 30 players on the roster 10 of them are freshmen.
Two of Liberty’s three losses this season have come against teams that have been ranked this season. Pittsburgh is currently No. 13 while Penn State was ranked No. 11 but has since fallen out of the rankings.
Since that loss to Pitt, the Lady Flames have gone undefeated with one tie and five straight wins.
Balanced Offense
13 different players have found the back of the net for this Liberty team with eight of them having scored multiple goals. As a team, they’ve scored 30 goals so far this season averaging 2.14 a game. 16 of those 30 have come against conference opponents. Last season they only had 35 goals in 18 games.
Midfielder McKinley Burkett leads the team with five goals on the season in 11 games played. Burkett is a redshirt senior in her third season with the Flames after transferring from Tennessee. Last season she appeared in 13 games and tallied one goal.
Allison Hansford isn’t far behind with four goals in 14 games so far. The forward is having a terrific freshman year. Hansford has been used as a super sub of sorts coming off the bench and providing an offensive boost.
One of the leaders of this team though is senior Bridie Herman. She’s a defender but has been good all over the field including contributing to the offense. The senior has three goals all of which are game winners as well as five assists so far. Herman has already been named the ASUN Defensive Player of the Week twice this season.
Herman has played 1,179 minutes, all but 81 minutes throughout the 14 games, in her second season with Liberty after transferring from Tennessee ahead of the 2021 season.
Defensive Domination
It hasn’t just been the offense that has found its footing this season. Defensively they’ve been solid conceding just 10 goals this season with five of those coming against Penn State and Pittsburgh.
They’ve tallied seven clean sheets, with four of those coming in conference play. In six conference games, they’ve only conceded two goals.
On the backline head coach Lang Wedemeyer has played some combination of Briede Herman, Haleigh Arostegui, Lena James, and Rebekah Earnest.
The defense is led by Ainsley Leja in goal. The sophomore has started all 14 games playing in all but 27 minutes this season. Leja only played in two games last season but has stepped into the starting role this season and has been good.
The goalie boasts a .73 goals against average which is third best in the ASUN and a save percentage of .804 which is currently ranked sixth.
Look Ahead
So far they have gone undefeated at home but have three straight away games before the ASUN Women’s Soccer Championship tournament. The Lady Flames have three games remaining and only one team has a winning record:
Oct. 13 at Jacksonville (4-3-3)
Oct. 16 at North Florida (3-6-1)
Oct. 21 at Eastern Kentucky (6-4-2)
Liberty fans can watch three out of their last four games on ESPN+ with the game against Jacksonville being the only one not available on the app.
The Lady Flames will have to continue their hot streak in their last four games with defending conference champions, Lipscomb, who are currently two points ahead of them in the conference standings.
In order for Liberty to secure a bid to the NCAA Tournament, they will need to win the ASUN tournament to get an automatic bid. Liberty’s strength of schedule and wins likely won’t be enough to make the tournament if they don’t win the conference.
The ASUN Women’s Soccer Championship will be played on October 27- November 4 at a location yet to be determined.
With tournament play looming and women’s sports betting gaining popularity fans in Virginia won’t be able to place bets on Liberty if sportsbooks choose to include women’s college soccer in the future. In Virginia, you can’t place bets on instate colleges no matter what the sport.
