Oregon women's soccer here to 'prove a statement' entering season-opener

The Oregon Ducks' highly anticipated debut in the Big Ten Conference is this week, and Graeme Abel believes he knows the tools needed to make the Ducks an aggressive competitor. And with an almost entirely new roster, it will be interesting to see what emerges.

Abel, the women's soccer coach now in his fifth season at Oregon, spoke ahead of his team's Thursday season-opener against Seattle at 7 p.m. at Papé Field. (Results were not available at press time.)

"They've always been athletic," he said. "Julie (Woodward, Seattle's coach) does a really good job there of getting good kids or local kids. They got a lot of kids that transferred back into that area as well, so they'll be athletic. They'll be organized. They'll be good. They're always good at talking."

The Ducks then host Portland State at 1 p.m. Sunday.

Ducks open at No. 18

Abel spoke briefly about what style of play is expected for Oregon and acknowledged the team's coaching staff in preparing the team physically.

"...When our teams have been at our best here, we've been on the front foot in terms of pressing teams," he said. "...And we put a lot of attacking players in, so we want to be on the front part of the field. Some really good athletes in terms of the set piece part of it, service. So, all around we want to be on the front foot, attacking team, good on set pieces. And that's when we've been at our best."

Oregon starts the season at No. 18 in the preseason poll, which is a tall mountain to climb. The Ducks welcome back goalkeeper Maddy Goldberg and midfielders Trinity Morales and Livvy Moore from their 0-16-3 run a year ago.

Oregon previewed its potential in a pair of exhibition games last week where they squeezed a 2-1 win over Oregon State and tied 1-1 with the Idaho Vandals. The games might not have mattered, but there was more to unravel about the Ducks.

"We've got depth," Abel said. "Experience, which is good, high-energy athletics. So, yeah, it's a good squad we put together. Really happy about it."

That was the culmination of a few major changes he made to the Ducks' program that brought 16 new players: eight transfers and eight freshmen.

"Reestablishing the basics for us, we probably moved away from that," Abel said. "So reestablishing that in January and making sure that we bedded in a bunch of new players in January, and then we did it again over the summer. So that was the focus in January through the spring and continued that into the summer and then into these past couple of weeks of preseason."

Goldberg, who finished second in the Pac-12 with 86 saves, said that although last season was rough for them as a team, she now feels they are moving in the right direction.

She added the experience the veteran transfers bring is what the team really needed to guide the freshmen in the right direction.

Among those eight freshmen looking to make an impact is local product Cloe Chase, who led the Marist Catholic soccer team to a 4A state title as a junior and won a state title in long jump as a senior.

Chase said the biggest lesson she's learned so far in her young college career has been the pace of play.

"Everyone is a lot fitter, a lot better," she said. "It's kind of going into like, you may be the best on your team, but when you step in, it's the big times. Big league."

'We're a team here to prove a statement'

When asked what question the team answered this early in the season, Morales confidently said: "We're a team here to prove a statement."

"When we're out there we're gonna attack, attack, attack," she said. "We have goal scorers, and we have a bunch of new positions that got filled in. I think we answered all the questions. There's no question left. It's just what we have to prove now."

One goal the junior midfielder hopes to reach is making the Big Ten tournament. But in order to do accomplish that the Ducks will face a tough schedule with seven opponents ranked in the top 10, including No. 1 UCLA, No. 3 Michigan State and No. 4 Nebraska, to name a few.

Morales, who has two career goals, said a personal goal for her is to score more and while the team's focused on finding success early in the season; there is no pressure to do so.

"We're all a really close team this year," she said. "I'm super excited, confidence-wise. We're good."

Edith Noriega is a sports reporter for The Register-Guard. You may reach her at ENoriega@gannett.com and follow her on Twitter at @Noriega_Edith .

This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: Oregon women's soccer here to 'prove a statement' entering season-opener