Elon University women’s soccer team saw a huge turnaround during the 2024 season. After winning just three out of 17 games during the 2023 season, they improved their record by 10 games en route to an appearance in the Coastal Athletic Association semifinals.
Looking back at their turnaround season, redshirt junior forward Isa Murdock and junior defender Grace Gelhaus said they believe the team was able to use its mindset to their advantage on a consistent basis.
“The mindset is there now,” Gelhaus said. “It’s more competitive and we’ve learned from our mistakes in the past two seasons.”
Head coach Neil Payne offered a similar opinion. He said he always believed everyone had the skills to win and the team just needed more experience in order to develop winning habits.
“The increase in wins last year was more to do with experience than anything else,” Payne said. “The quality was always there, it just needed time to develop and cultivate.”
With high hopes for next season, there’s an increased urgency to use last year’s bounce back season as motivation for an even better 2025 campaign.
In practice, they are expecting to improve in multiple areas. Murdock said on offense, the team wants to elevate its ability to put away opponents earlier in games. According to Murdock, the players have taken steps toward translating that mindset in practices and games, such as their first exhibition game against University of South Carolina Upstate.
“We scored four goals, which is something that we were looking at doing more instead of just winning by one,” Murdock said.
In Elon’s 18 games during the 2024 season, they only won three games by more than one goal.
Defensively, Gelhaus said everyone is looking to play with even more intensity through working together as a unit.
“Coach talks a lot about being ruthless in front of the goal as well as connections and chemistry on the field,” Gelhaus said. “That’s something that we’ve been working on, and it’s been working for us.”
Defense was particularly one of the hallmarks of Elon’s turnaround. The Phoenix improved from seventh in goals allowed to being tied for the second fewest allowed with only 17.
Gelhaus said for the team to continue its success on that end, they have to stay organized. With two starters in Katie Lowe ’25 and Olivia McManes ’25 now graduated, Gelhaus acknowledged that it will be important for everyone to take on the responsibilities of talking and organizing the backline.
Overall, experience will be an advantage for Elon as a healthy number of their key contributors will be returning next season. Of the players who played in at least 10 games last year, only three have graduated.
Payne said he was excited to have many players returning. He said he believes it will be important for establishing many of the team’s principles with the season underway.
“It’s vital for the culture, standards and expectations,” Payne said. “This is a group that because they’re experienced, they can self organize, push each other on the field, and hold each other accountable off of it as well.”
Looking ahead to this season, Payne said he believes it’s important for the team to evaluate where they might have fallen short of the CAA Championship the previous season. He said the maturity from everybody has gotten stronger each year, which will be essential against some of the other top teams in the conference.
“They got a good understanding of what it takes to do well in conference play last year,” Payne said. “That’s something we really learned last year and I expect that to follow into this season.”