When the announcement came, it was coupled with a big sigh of relief from Kevin Boyd.
With the players on the ASU women's soccer team gathered at his house last November to watch the NCAA Selection Show, Boyd, in his third year as the program's coach, joined in ebullient celebration as the squad earned its first postseason bid since 2003.
“I guess my thought was, 'It's about time,'” Boyd recalled of his emotion upon hearing the announcement.
The Sun Devils needed a pair of dramatic narrow wins over the Oregon schools on the final weekend of the season to get in to the tournament, where ASU (which finished the 2009 season with a 9-7-4 record) suffered a first-round defeat in a shootout at the hands of Wisconsin.
Despite an early exit in the frigid Midwest, though, Boyd is hopeful the taste of playing postseason soccer will be enough to convince his players they belong there every year.
“That's something we're trying to build into this program,” Boyd said. “It takes a lot of change in the mentality of the players as well. They need to evolve from just hoping to make it [to the postseason] and figuring out how to get there to believing they should be there every year. And there's a dramatic difference between those two attitudes.”
Boyd took the head coaching job at ASU in 2007 after 10 seasons at the helm of Cal, where he compiled a record of 130-63-20 that included eight NCAA Tournament appearances. While Boyd appears to be on the verge of creating another powerful Pac-10 program, he says instilling the confidence in his players, making them believe they should win each time they step on the pitch, is the biggest obstacle to overcome.
“I definitely know it's a step-by-step process,” he said. “The first step is making the playoffs, and the second step is making it a second time and cementing into the players that that's where they belong.
“I would hope they're walking around with an attitude or a thought process of 'I want to be in the playoffs and I want to go further.'”
A key cog in helping the Sun Devils accomplish that second step and make back-to-back NCAA Tournament trips for just the second time in school history (2002-03) will be the on-field play and leadership skills of Alexandra Elston.
As a junior, the midfielder earned was an All-Pac-10 honorable mention with a team-leading 20 points on seven goals and six assists, including a penalty-kick goal in the 76th minute against Oregon in the final game of the regular season that helped propel the Sun Devils into the postseason.
Her skill sets make Elston the most talented player on the pitch in Tempe, and Boyd is hoping she will trust her leadership abilities this season as well, equally important for a team that welcomes nine freshman to the fold.
“Her talent is undeniable,” Boyd said. “What I hope we get out of her in her senior year is, I hope she carries the confidence that her game should have. I hope she comes out of her shell a little bit more and takes ownership at midfield with the way we play and the way we attack.”
ASU's incoming recruiting class of nine players includes two players from the national team pool in goalkeeper Vittoria Arnold and forward Devin Marshall.
“There's always a learning process,” Boyd said of his new players, “but absolutely I think some of these players will contribute immediately. There's no question about it.”
Boyd believes the Sun Devils will have a new look this season as it attempts to adjust to its strengths. With the departure of defender Liz Harkin, a first-team All-Pac-10 team member last season and one of the most decorated players in the program's history, the coach believes the team will find strong suite will shift to a talented front line.
“Next year there are going to be big question marks in the back line, similar in midfield, and I believe we'll be quite a bit stronger on the front line,” Boyd said. “Whereas in the last three years, we've been very good on the back line, OK in the midfield — sometimes that varied — and then we've struggled a bit on the front line. So we've kind of turned on end if that makes sense.”
In addition to helping better the product on the field, Boyd's tenure in Tempe has also focused on rallying support and excitement around the program. The team has been involved in efforts to stretch itself into the local soccer community through camps and various other activities, and Boyd hopes the work, coupled with making the postseason last year — not to mention some of the buzz around the sport thanks to this year's World Cup — will bring more people to Sun Devil Soccer Stadium this fall.
“I think it's a lot easier to watch, support and get excited about a team when you know the people involved,” the coach said. “It's an exciting game when you know who the people [playing] are and you're invested into them winning. I hope as we connect to the community, more and more people will come out and bring excitement to the game.
“From a student standpoint, I know there's a great love for the game, and I'd love to see more students out to the games.”
