Tom Timmermann
When Lyndsey Heckel came to St. Louis University to play soccer from Nerinx Hall, it turned her world around.
Heckel had been an offensive player at Nerinx, one of the best in the state. As a junior, she had 17 goals and 17 assists and was an all-state and all-Metro selection. And when she arrived at SLU, coach Katie Shields and assistant coach Chris Allen promptly converted her to a defender.
She now had to look at the field from another direction.
"It's given me a new perspective of how I see the game," Heckel said. "How we keep the ball better now and how to build up through the phases of the game. I like being able to see the entire field now. I mean, I could see the entire field, but backwards when I was an offensive player, but I like it now. I tell people this all the time: I don't think I'd go back, ever. I like where I'm at now, and I wouldn't change it for the world."
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Who knows what offensive success Heckel may have had in college, but on defense, she's been a heck of a player: the school's first first team All-American, a two-time Atlantic 10 defensive player of the year, a five-time first team all-conference selection, among a whole barrage of honors. SLU's defense has been exemplary; this year, it has allowed just 10 goals in 21 games.
Next up for SLU is its biggest test, a showdown with top-seeded USC in the second round of the NCAA Tournament on Friday in Irvine, California. USC is ranked fourth in the United Soccer Coaches poll and fifth in the NCAA's RPI. The Trojans (16-1-3) are as tough an opponent as SLU (15-1-6) has faced.
It's the rare chance for SLU to be an underdog. It doesn't happen much in the regular season, where the Billikens have won six of the past seven Atlantic 10 regular-season championships and each of the past seven conference tournaments. In the past seven seasons, SLU has lost just three A-10 games.
"We go through the season and we're expected to win the majority of our games, especially in the A-10," Heckel said. "We're being hunted by everybody, as Katie would say, whereas this time, we get to do the hunting. They have everything to lose. They're the one seed, we're the underdog, and we love talking about underdog mentality and playing like it. So I think it's more focusing on us and what we what we can control and what we can do as the so-called underdogs in this situation."
"A quote we use in our program a lot," Shields said, "is the belief of a champion -- we know what that feels like and what that takes -- but the mentality everyday of an underdog. When you think about St. Louis University and where our program has come from, we've never been a blue blood. ... It's an easy role for us to tap into and assume. And I mean, I love it. It's freedom. There's nothing to lose, and it should be very freeing but also you feel like you have some of the talent that it's going to take to perform in these games, but we're going to have to play our best soccer for sure."
There's no doubt they'll get that from Heckel.
"Maybe the best coaching decision we -- and our former associate head coach, Chris Allen, gets a lot of credit for that one as well -- ever made, for sure," Shields said. "We've never had one as good as her. I think until somebody does it at the level she's done it, she set a new standard for what an elite center back looks like in our program."
The move has had its challenges. While Heckel feels she has the personality to be a center back in how she plays, she's also introverted, which can complicate things for someone who has to spend 90 minutes yelling at teammates, directing traffic, making sure everything is buttoned down.
"I still haven't perfected that art, but yes, I've definitely grown in that in my years of playing it," she said, "and it's definitely been a challenge. It's always been something that Katie's challenged me to work on, whether that's in the spring or the offseason and even throughout the fall seasons of my time here.
"You can't take off two minutes because the other team can do something and it could change just like that. You have to be switched on at all times. It's very tiring from the mental aspect, just being clued in and switched on at all times."
SLU's past two games have shown what Heckel can do, no matter which end of the field she's on. In the championship game of the Atlantic 10 tournament, she put SLU ahead with a header off a corner kick, her sixth goal of the season, the second-most on the team.
Five days later, in SLU's opening NCAA game against Kansas, the Jayhawks very nearly scored to tie the game in the 83rd minute, only this time, there was Heckel, a foot or so off the goal line, heading the ball out of danger before it could bounce into the net.
"That's Lyndsey to a T," said Shields. "She does it in training every day. She saves stuff off the line. She scores goals with her head. She does some tremendous individual defending but then also leads the back line in our collective defending."
"Lyndsey is a one-of-a-kind player, a great teammate," said SLU goalkeeper Emily Puricelli, who has had a front row seat from directly behind Heckel for five seasons. "Scores big goals when it's needed, and comes up for us in huge times. So it's awesome to play with her.
"She headed the ball off the line. She made a really good play, a toe poke right away from a girl that was at the top of the 18 that could have easily scored from there. She does little things every single day, and it shows up in games. It's awesome."
No matter how you look at it.
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