New Found Success For Southampton Girls Soccer Has Been Building For Years

There is a recipe for success when it comes to building a winning varsity sports program.

A deep commitment from the head coach; a strong network of parental support; a flourishing youth and travel team program; and, perhaps most importantly, a year-round passion for the sport from the players.

It’s been a long time coming, but the Southampton girls soccer team has finally combined those ingredients, and the proof has been on the field the last few seasons.

The Mariners are currently 4-2 in League VIII, third behind Class B rival Babylon and Elwood/John Glenn. So far this season, they’ve beaten longtime soccer powerhouse Center Moriches, in a 2-1 win, and took Class A power Elwood/John Glenn to the brink on Monday, dominating possession at times but coming up short in a 1-0 loss. The players have not been shy about stating their goals for the season — they will be disappointed with anything short of a county title, eager to bring home what would be the first-ever county championship banner for the program. It’s a realistic goal as well, as the team graduated just one senior starter from last year’s squad, which was narrowly edged out in the county semifinals by Babylon.

The recent success of the program has been nothing short of remarkable, considering its history. The girls soccer team has traditionally been a kind of second-class citizen when it comes to the hierarchy of fall sports at Southampton, struggling to be competitive while living in the shadow of both the boys soccer team — a perennial playoff contender that won the Suffolk County and Long Island Class B titles in 2015 and also has an undefeated League VII championship banner in the gym— and the field hockey program, which has been consistently competitive for decades and won a state championship in 1999. For years, the Mariners were on the wrong end of lopsided shutouts against teams like Mattituck, Babylon and Center Moriches, and also spent several seasons competing in a developmental league for programs that couldn’t quite get their footing.

A turning point came four years ago, when a group of mostly eighth-graders who had been playing together on youth teams with Southampton Town United (also known as Southampton Soccer Club) decided to take a pivotal next step that would come to define their futures as players, and the fate of the program at Southampton. Andreas Lindberg, the executive director of the club, knew the group had a chance to do something special if they stayed together and were willing to put in time and energy it takes to continually up their game. So he gathered their parents together and told them what they needed to do.

“We had a meeting and talked about doing an academy team, which is something we’d done on the boys side for years,” Lindberg said. “For the first time in the club’s history, we thought we had the talent level and the commitment level to do it.”

The girls had already seen success at high levels within the Long Island Junior Soccer League, but making the leap up to form an academy team meant a significant commitment to practicing, training and traveling on a year-round basis. The players and their parents did not hesitate, and the team that was formed included nearly all of the current Mariners starting lineup, as well as a few talented players from East Hampton, Sag Harbor and Hampton Bays. The desire of those parents and players four years ago to take it to that next level is currently paying dividends for the Southampton varsity team and should continue to do so for years to come. Southampton has just one senior starter — goalie Kendra Jimenez — and a standout junior class that make the team a strong contender for the county title both this year and next.

“This is the best girls team we’ve ever had,” Lindberg said, referring specifically to the academy team, but it rings true for the Southampton varsity squad as well. Lindberg said that while he initiated the conversation about starting the academy team, credit for the success at both the club and high school level does not belong to him.

“We said we thought the girls had a chance to do something really special in the future for their high school teams, and the parents and the kids bought in,” Lindberg said.

Consistency and quality in coaching have been key as well. Varsity head coach Sean Zay is in his second full year as head coach for the team, but was the junior varsity assistant coach for several seasons before that, allowing him to see the potential the team had, even as many of them skipped the JV squad entirely and were moved up to varsity as eighth-graders. On the club side, longtime Southampton Town United coach Gary Easlick has been leading the girls team for the last few years, and Lindberg said he also deserves credit for their continued development as a powerhouse team.

Creating a legacy as the group that started it all is something the Southampton players think about and take pride in, and they are intent not only on earning what would be the first championship banner for the program, but leaving their mark on the school as well.

“This is a very tight-knit group of girls who have been playing together for their entire lives,” Zay said. He remembers the moment it became crystal clear to him that the team was unlike any the program had put on the field before — the team was hosting Class A powerhouse Harborfields in a home game on a Saturday last season, and took the Tornadoes to double overtime before losing, 1-0. Harborfields went on to finish as the runner-up in a very competitive Class A playoff bracket.

“We were able to take a school like Harborfields to double overtime,” Zay said. “After the game, the coach said to me, ‘These girls are good.’ And our only senior last year was our keeper.”

The Harborfields loss was a crucial confidence builder for the players, many of whom were sophomores.

“They’re a really good team, and we had lost to them in the past, but last year we really stepped up our game and played great ball,” junior tri-captain Ellie Avallone said. “It showed us that we can beat these higher level teams, and it felt really good that we were able to hold them off until double overtime.”

Hanging tough with some of the top Class A teams in the county — like Glenn and Harborfields — has added to the confidence of a team that has always had a secret weapon in its strong chemistry. Avallone and her fellow captains, juniors Carli Cameron and Charlotte Cardel, all spoke about the strong bond among the team, which started when they were just elementary school students playing for Southampton Town United.

“It’s been such a pleasure to play with these girls,” Cameron said. “Having this kind of chemistry has just been an amazing gift.”

There’s also the pride that comes with their newfound status as one of the headline-grabbing teams within the community. It feels good, they said, to finally garner the same kind of attention from peers and school staff that the boys soccer team has become accustomed to over the years.

“Another thing that pushes us is that we’re girls and we’re such a good team and we can show that it’s not just about the boys, it’s about us too,” Cameron said. “The teachers will talk about us now and know about the team, and that’s a really cool experience.”

That drive and competitive spark to prove themselves and constantly improve has been there from the start with this group, according to those who know them best. Teague Cameron is the father of Carli and Hailey Cameron, who both play on the varsity team, while his youngest daughter also plays with Southampton Town United. He is one of the parent managers for the travel team, and he said he remembers when the players were younger and first competing on varsity as eighth-graders. They had a taste of a lopsided 10-0 loss at Sayville and were determined to make those kinds of defeats a thing of the past.

“I remember that game, when Carli was an eighth-grader, and afterwards she said, ‘I never want to lose like that again,’” Mr. Cameron said. “They’ve always had that feeling of pride there.”

Mr. Cameron gave credit to the group of girls for being “self-motivated” over the years and said that while they have an intense desire to win, they have managed to stay grounded and keep it all in perspective as well.

“They don’t get too high after a win and don’t get too low either,” he said. “They have a good balance there and always know where they can improve.”

There is one other factor that the players and coaches say plays a role in their success — the increased high profile and media presence of the U.S. Women’s National team over the years. The Southampton players follow the team and see the women on that powerhouse squad as role models, both because of the way they play on the field and the way they conduct themselves off the field. Tri-captain Charlotte Cardel says she avidly watches game footage of Julie Ertz, who plays the same position as her, and Avallone said she can draw parallels between the experience of that world famous team and her own high school squad.

“I watch a lot of their games, and I think it shows us that girls can be good, and that it’s not just boys that are good,” she said. “The U.S. women’s team winning games proves that girls have power too, and I think that’s a good thing that’s being shown to the world.”

The Mariners might not have the attention of the world, but they’ve certainly been on the minds of other teams and coaches throughout Suffolk County in a way they never have before, a fact they’re still adjusting to, but thoroughly enjoying.

“We’re almost kind of in shock right now, because the season was so delayed and then all of a sudden we became one of the top teams,” Cardel said. “It kind of feels real now, and the pressure is on, but I think we’re going to achieve something great.”