- Mobile Edition - Mobile EditionThere are some big shoes to fill for this year's Skyhawks Seven.
Nichole Kluk, last year's Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Defensive Player of the Year, is gone.
Jamie MacArthur, last year's RMAC Preseason Player of the Year and the program's first All-American, is gone.
Kluk and MacArthur co-captained three other seniors - Jessica Otero, Samantha Smith and Samantha Scales - to the program's most historic season to date. They finished their run at FLC as the most successful class in the 15-year history of the women's program.
Fort Lewis finished last season 19-3-2 overall, 12-2-2 RMAC and 19th in the final National Soccer Coaches Association of America top 25 poll. FLC lost at home to Colorado School of Mines in the second round of the NCAA Division II Women's Soccer Championships.
Based on that success, head coach Damian Clarke went back to the New Mexico well.
Five of the Skyhawks' recruits last year were from New Mexico, and Clarke grabbed two more in his latest class, in the hopes of unearthing more Kluks (Los Alamos, N.M.) and MacArthurs (Albuquerque) from the Land of Enchantment.
Lauren Riley, a defender, is from La Cueva High School in Albuquerque.
Elizabeth Romero, a utility player, is from Sandia High School in Albuquerque.
Clarke said in a news release “we feel very fortunate to have landed" Riley. “Lauren had plenty of options to play at a number of schools, and she chose Fort Lewis," Clarke said of the District Player of the Year. “She is an exceptional athlete with excellent speed and has been coached very well at her club.
“This is a player who is a hard-nosed defender, with the ability to win balls in the air and in the tackle."
Romero “is a very exciting player for us to have," Clarke said. “She and a few of the other girls in the class are really going to add an element of size, strength, pace and competitiveness to a very talented group of returners."
Clarke said Romero can play all over the pitch, even goalkeeper in a pinch.
“This is a player that scores, assists and is really just a big athletic, difficult player to deal with," Clarke said.
Romero had 17 goals and six assists as a junior at Sandia, then had seven goals and 14 assists as a senior. She averaged 10 goals and nine assists per season in high school.
Joining the two Albuquerque players are Taylor Tegtmeyer and Madyson Wellcome from Chandler, Ariz., Emma Cannis from Gilbert, Ariz., Amanda Snider from Las Vegas, Nev., and local product Morgan Gurule from Durango High School.
Snider is the only goalkeeper of this year's Skyhawks Seven recruiting class, and she is the first Nevada product in program history.
heraldsports@durangoherald.com