Making Goals
JEN GARDNER started kicking a ball just about the same time she started walking. By the time she was ten, she was playing organized soccer and she's been playing ever since.
This fall, Gardner will return as a senior for her fifth and final year on the University of Florida soccer team. The decision to originally come to Florida wasn't an easy one. By the time she fin ished high school, Gardner , who was also an accomplished 
volleyball player, had nine scholarship offers. “It was one of the toughest decisions I've ever had to make,” said Gardner . “I had to choose between volleyball and soccer and which school to attend.” Gardner had offers from Georgia , Tennessee and Clemson among others, but chose Florida after her visit. “The coaches really impressed me with their enthusiasm for the sport and for the Gators. Florida also had a reputation of being one of the hardest working teams anywhere. I knew I'd be challenged to become the best player I could be, and that's what I was looking for.”
That reputation as a hard working team comes directly from Coach Becky Burleigh who came to Florida ten years ago to build the soccer program. Burleigh starts each season in August by putting the team through grueling three-a-day practice schedules. Each practice lasts approximately an hour and a half and focuses on slightly different things. The first practice, of each day, emphasizes fitness and starts around 6:30 am, almost before the sun comes up at. That's followed by one at 11:00 am which focuses on style of play, defenses and strategy. Finally, there's one at 5:30 pm where the players get a chance to scrimmage. “In between we shower, eat and go to classes or study,” said Gardner , who will be entering graduate school in Health Education. “There's not much time to do much else.”
“To be successful in soccer, a team has to have both physical and mental toughness,” said Burleigh. “Some of the girls we recruit, even top recruits, don't make it through three-a-days when they see what we expect of them.” That physical and mental toughness has paid off for the Gators who beat Tennessee to capture the Southeastern Conference Tournament last season for the seventh time in ten years.
“That was definitely a highlight of the year,” said Gardner, who had a record-setting year of her own.
Halfway through the season, she was asked to switch from field player to goalie.
“I had been practicing some as backup goalie but I had to quickly develop a whole different mindset and put to use some very different skills. It was challenging. But that's what I like.” Gardner was up to the challenge. By the end of the season she ranked among the nation's top 25 goalkeepers with a ‘Goals Against Average' of .70, and she was also the only goalkeeper among the nation's 25 that logged minutes as both a field player and goalkeeper.
Winning tournaments and excelling on the field isn't the only thing these Gators do. Ansley Myrick, who plays defense for the Gators, got involved off the field as a speaker for the Goodwill Gator program. Myrick spoke to children who are at risk of not making it to the next grade level because of poor grades. Majoring in Communication Sciences and Disorders, Myrick talked to the kids about her own experience of balancing being on the Gator soccer team with schoolwork. “Soccer can take up a lot of time so you have to make sure you make time for all your school work. It helps to plan ahead.”
When not practicing or studying or playing in matches, Gardner, Myrick, and the rest of the team do pretty much what any University of Florida student might do. “We hang out a lot together and go to movies and out to eat.” Whether they are on the field or off, it always comes back to one thing for these Gators. “It's not about the recognition,” said Myrick. “It's about doing your best for the team.”
This is exactly what Coach Burleigh expects - and her expectations are high. “It's great winning the SEC, said Coach Burleigh. “But we've only been to the Final Four of the NCAA Tournament twice. I want us to be a perennial participant.”
With 24 letter winners returning, and a highly touted recruiting class, there's good reason to believe that the Gators will do just that. G