Women's soccer fills holes with class of '09

With seven teams that made last year's NCAA Tournament scheduled to face the women's soccer team next season — including the UCLA squad that defeated Princeton in the national semifinals — head coach Julie Shackford will discover early on how her new Tigers compare to last year's unit.

At the moment, she can only guess the impact of losing a stellar senior class that includes two-time Ivy League Player of the Year Esmeralda Negron. But an incoming recruiting class ranked 17th in the country by Soccer Buzz magazine gives Shackford a reason to remain confident.

"We'll obviously lose a lot of physicality [with the departure of the seniors]," Shackford said, "but the trademark of the incoming class is that it's a very technical class. [The recruits] are all very good with their feet. We'll have a more tactical team overall."

Leading the way for the Class of 2009 are two players included on Soccer Buzz's list of the year's 100 top high school recruits — Jennifer Om, a Fairfax, Va., native, soon to graduate from Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, and Taylor Numann, who hails from San Jose, Calif. The duo will provide Princeton with immediate depth and flexibility, since both players are capable of playing as midfielders or as backs.

At the same time, though, Shackford cannot help but envision the multi-talented Om contributing to the team in a very specific way.

"Om will definitely compete for a starting spot right away," Shackford said. "She's a good distributor and very technically sound. I see her as a holding midfielder, who would sit ahead of the back four and behind [midfielder] Diana [Matheson, the reigning Ivy League Rookie of the Year]."

That is the same position where Numann excelled in high school, but her tremendous athleticism and experience as a defender will no doubt provide her with alternate ways of making an impression.

Rounding out the class is a quintet of players whose immediate importance to the team remains to be seen, but who Princeton fans should nonetheless keep an eye on this season.

Sarah Peteraf, Sarah Steele and Allison Williams will join a talented pack of Tiger midfielders that will lose seniors Kristina Fontanez and Elizabeth Pillion from its ranks to graduation. Whereas fellow newcomers Om and Numann are midfielders capable of duties in the backfield, Peteraf, Steele and Williams are known more for their scoring abilities and may see time as forwards.

Peteraf is a High School All-American and proven winner. As a speedy outside midfielder at Hanover High School, she led her team to three New Hampshire Class I championships. Steele, a fellow All-American, is a prolific goalscorer from Longmeadow, Mass. Williams, a native of Mount Laurel, N.J., demonstrated her own knack for finding the back of the net over four years at Lenape High School.

Perhaps the most intriguing scoring threat joining the Tigers next season is forward Aarti Jain of Arcadia, Calif. Combining the speed that made her a standout for her high school track team with a wealth of offensive creativity, Jain, like Negron, has the type of one-on-one ability even the most casual of soccer fans can appreciate.

Meanwhile, on defense, the size and strength of Allison Scott of Coppell, Texas, will be a welcome addition. Coppell will try to help the Tiger defense rebound from the loss of punishing senior defenders Brea Griffiths and Catherine Byrd, along with sisters Rochelle and Janine Willis.

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No matter how much Coppell and the other members of the Class of 2009 thrive, however, they alone will not be able to fill the void left by the most successful seniors in Princeton history. All that Tiger fans can hope for is that, in four years, they will be able to say the same thing about the Class of 2013.