The All State

Media Credit: Lois Jones The 2007 line-up of The Lady Govs soccer team has a combination of 14 new players including 12 freshmen and nine returning players. The Lady Govs were picked to finish sixth in the OVC preseason poll. [Click to enlarge]

The Austin Peay State University Lady Govs soccer team has 14 new players this year. Kelly Cannon and Kari Cleland are just two of the 12 freshmen that compose the new players list.

While observers may doubt the Lady Govs potential to win games with a lot of young players in addition to the loss of experienced talent like Tara Tidwell, Erica Dengler and Adonia Bivins, Head Coach Kelly Guth and returning junior forward Ashley Beck have no doubts about the abilities of this year's team.

The Lady Govs finished last season with a 6-10-3 record (3-4-2 OVC). This season they have been picked to finish sixth.

Ashley Beck broke the APSU record for goals scored in one season and led the team with 17 points. At Morgan Brothers Soccer Field on the last day of two-a-day practices for the Lady Govs before their first game of the season, Beck scores several goals during scrimmages, but her team does not win. It is 100 degrees outside and the only shade on the field is the shadows the players cast as they run around. Like her teammates, Beck is tired, hot and optimistic about the upcoming season.

"I think that we have really come a long way in the short time that we have been here," Beck said. "I definitely think that we have the potential to be a better team than we have ever been this year. It is just a matter of working together and working as a unit. I really think that losing the people we lost isn't going to hit us at all. We are going to be a better team."

On the sideline, Coach Guth walks barefoot among Gatorade squirt bottles that litter the turf like fallen leaves. In a black T-shirt sporting the school's colors and matching shades, she shouts directions constantly such as "Occupy space" and "Apply pressure to the ball." Guth evaluates, teaches and praises the players when they do well.

Continued...

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