After putting up a 2-7-8 record during the fall season and a 6-1 record in the spring season, Head Coach Stephen Salas has begun his third season coaching the soccer team.
Last season, the team tied eight times in the 17 games it played. The Wildcats failed to win a Western Athletic Conference game, posting a 0-5-2 record. That gave them the seventh spot out of eight in the standings and forced them to miss the WAC tournament by one spot.
Salas wants this season to be a different story for his team.
“We’ve trained resilience, we’ve trained leadership a lot in the spring and then going into fall, and we’ve seen that,” Salas said. “No ties so far.”
The spring featured key moments for the Wildcats, including the program’s first win against a Power Four opponent when it beat SMU. The only loss for the team was to No. 24 Texas Tech.
Through the first two games of the 2025 season, the team is 1-1 with a win against the University of Texas El Paso 1-0 and a loss against New Mexico State University 0-1. The Wildcats are scheduled to play the University of Tulsa and Houston Christian University after the time of print.
With the loss of key players Chayse Thorn and Georgia Gunther this season, other players will have to step up to fill the void. The roster features ten seniors this season, which Salas believes will ease the loss of Thorn and Gunther.
“We have a lot of seniors this year, and so I would say that they’re my number one motivation for this year,” said Gracie Kelly, sophomore defender from Corona, California. “This is their last year playing soccer and just to work for them and have the most successful season we can.”
Two seniors that Salas says have stepped during the spring and in the fall are Amelia Leggett, senior forward from Wylie, and Peyton Hill, redshirt junior forward from Laguna Niguel, California.
Leggett scored one goal in five shots in the two games she has started, and Hill had three shots on goal in four shots.
Salas expects Kelly to be a valuable player for the team this year despite her only being a sophomore.
“Gracie Kelly has really stepped into her own,” he said. “She’s a center back, kind of has a chip on her shoulder, probably should’ve won freshman of the year last year. [She] had a goal-line save against UTEP, preserved the win. It was unbelievable.”
One of the key matchups for the Wildcats for this season will be against Baylor on September 14. It will be the team’s final game before beginning conference play against California Baptist University on September 25.
After a disappointing conference showing last season, Salas hopes his team is able to compete for a conference championship this season.
