The Eagles last season went 14-5-1 overall with a 6-0-1 record in the A-SUN. They were the No. 1 seed in the conference tournament. After a first round bye, FGCU faced No. 4 Kennesaw, winning 2-1 in the semifinals before beating No. 2 Lipscomb 2-0 in a championship rematch and claiming another automatic bid in the national tournament before falling to Florida in the first round.
The 2017 schedule is comprised of three NCAA Tournament teams from 2016, including a national quarterfinalist, six RPI Top 100 teams and seven programs that broke the 10-win mark last year.
Of course, FGCU will lose players like Paulina Speckmaier and Tabby Tindell as they graduated, but will gain newcomers joining us like sophomores Marjorie Boilesen from UWF and Petra Smetkova from Arkansas and freshman Natalie Schaps.
Teams FGCU faced in the past in non-conference play include Kent State, Liberty, Arizona, UCF and FIU.
FGCU will play South Carolina and Georgia Southern to open the season.
The Gamecocks were 21-2-1 overall with a 11-0 record in the SEC last season and at the time were ranked No. 3 in the nation.
Although they beat Texas A&M in the SEC tournament semifinals, they lost to Florida in finals, but were able to qualify for the national tournament as an at-large bid. They beat Alabama St. 7-0 in the first round, Colorado 1-0 in the second round and Brigham Young (BYU) in the sweet sixteen before falling 1-0 to UNC in the Elite Eight. Currently, South Carolina is ranked No. 5 in the nation after their Elite Eight loss.
Georgia Southern was 6-10-1 overall with a 3-7 record in the Sun Belt Conference. This will be the first time the teams will play each other, so you could say it's the "Battle of the Eagles".
The last time FGCU and South Carolina faced each other was in 2014. The Gamecocks won 2-0.
Kent State was 15-3-2 overall with a 8-1-2 record in the MAC Conference. They won the conference tournament and automatically advanced to the national tournament before falling to Northwestern in the first round.
FGCU and Kent State have faced off in 2010 with the Golden Flashes emerging victorious 2-1.
Liberty University was 14-8 overall with a 7-2 record in the Big South Conference. They won the conference tournament before falling to UNC in the first round.
This will be the second time FGCU and Liberty will face each other. The first time, FGCU beat the Flames 1-0 last season.
The Arizona Wildcats were 9-9-1 overall with a 4-7 record in the Pac-12 Conference. They did not make the national tournament and there was no conference tournament for women's soccer in the Pac-12.
Last time the Eagles and the Wildcats met, FGCU won 2-0 in 2014.
FIU and UCF have played FGCU for numerous seasons. Overall FGCU is 8-1-1 overall against FIU, but have yet to beat UCF (0-4-2).
FIU was 3-11-3 overall with a 2-6-2 record in Conference USA while UCF was 9-8-2 overall with a 4-4-1 record in the AAC. FIU failed to qualify for their conference tournament while UCF fell to Southern Methodist (SMU) in the first round.
Teams that FGCU will play for the first time in program history include Valpariso, Eastern Michigan (EMU), Arizona State, and Webber International (NAIA).
Eastern Michigan was 6-10-4 overall with a 4-5-2 record in the MAC Conference. They fell to Kent State in the quarterfinals.
The Arizona State Sun Devils were 6-11-2 overall with a 1-9-1 record in the PAC 12 Conference. Like their in-state conference rival, Arizona, they did not make it to the national tournament.
The only team I would never think FGCU would play in their entire life would be Webber International. I'm curious to know why we are playing them in the first place, let alone why are we playing a team that is from the NAIA?
Webber was 3-9-1 overall with a 2-7-1 record in the NAIA's Sun Conference.
After their first four season games with GSU and South Carolina, Valpariso and EMU, FGCU opens their home part of the season with Kent State and Liberty.
After the game against Webber, FGCU will start conference on the road at Stetson (Sept. 23rd) before playing two games against Lipscomb (Sept. 29th) and Kennesaw (Oct. 1st).
The Eagles will be on the road playing NJIT, USC Upstate and JU before playing a non-conference home game against FIU and wrapping up conference at home against UNF. The game against UNF would assumingly be senior night for seven seniors: Lauren Greene, Paige Law, Nikki Hudson, Kiana Rugar, Ashley Parks, Meghan Mulligan, Elyse Hansen and Varin Ness.
Rugar (Albany) and Ness (NCAA DII Carson-Newman) are the only senior transfers for FGCU, although Rugar is a grad student.
Although listed as a redshirt junior, Hansen will be walking with the other seniors.
Nevertheless, this season is gonna be something for the FGCU women's soccer team.
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