Women's soccer team has their last season

Many club sports are relocating or disbanding due to new dorms coming soon.
Illustration courtesy of Jeff Exstrum

How club sports will be affected by new dorms

As new dorms move in, the CU Denver’s Women’s Soccer team is moving out. Most teams are either moving to continue playing elsewhere, or disbanding and discontinuing their membership as part of the CU Denver community entirely. But it becomes apparent that all is not lost as the Women’s Soccer Team Captain, Kori Baker, details the memories she’s made while on the team. She says with vigor, “I mean I liked meeting new people and traveling was really fun…I liked the CU Denver team because it’s just fun, it’s very different from how it was growing up.”

During the season the Women’s Soccer team showed off their skills in a variety of locations including Wyoming, Mesa, and Colorado Springs. When asked about her favorite away game Baker replied, “I think the Mesa trip was the most fun because we went up and stayed the night and stuff, so that was good.”

Baker, along with teammate Angie Adame, who plays left out back, both agree that their best game was played an away game against Regis University. The game started slowly for the CU Denver Women’s team, with their player’s positioning a little scattered and the opposing team scoring within the first five minutes. But the ladies quickly made a heroic comeback with a game tying goal scored by player Addison Di Marco.

“We (the CU Denver team) were like ‘we know we can do this, so let’s prove it,’” Adame said when asked about the team’s overall attitude. The fierce battle against Regis University was the only one that continued into overtime, and finally ended with a tied score of two goals for each team.

“It was exhausting, it was tiring, but it was phenomenal,” Adame said with a proud smile. “It was probably the hardest fought game we had all season. I loved the game, if we could redo it again I totally would because I think that we would kick butt after.”

Though the Women’s Soccer Team didn’t take home many victories this season, Baker still says that their last season went well. “It was good considering the numbers that we had. We had fun, so think that’s really all that matters.”

Following the beginning of construction of the new dorm facilities, the Club Sports scene will be changing drastically.

Sports teams with high player retention rates that depend on the field for games and practices, such as Men’s Lacrosse, are currently in a desperate search for other locations where they can continue to do what they love. Other teams with lower retention rates, such as the women’s soccer team, are choosing to disburse as a result of the sudden changes. Ultimate Sports, which are sports CU Denver students can join to play against other CU Denver students for fun, will be completely gone by spring.

The Club sports program will be welcoming new teams into the spotlight in spring of 2020. According to Adame, who also works as the Competitive Sports Program Manager, the program will be shifting their attention to mainly indoor sports. Students can expect Men’s Basketball to make a reappearance, as well as the addition of a badminton team for the first time since the Club Sports program started in 2013.