AMHERST, N.Y. — On the first day of classes at the University at Buffalo, the women’s soccer team is already off to a hot start.
In the latest Top-Drawer Soccer rankings, the Bulls came in at No. 25 for the first time in program history.
“One of my teammates walked into our locker room and she was like, ‘did you see the Instagram post?’ and I was like ‘no way,’” fifth year left wing Olivia Bizzoni said.
“Seeing 25 on there for the first time, that's such an accomplishment and I couldn't be more proud to be part of the team that's up there,” Sophomore goalkeeper Lexie Thompson said.
“Any time you can do a first in program history just means you're doing a lot of things right,” Bulls head coach Shawn Burke said.
This news comes just a week after the team knocked off nationally-ranked Pitt for the Bulls’ first win over a top-10 team in school history.
UB players and coaches have acknowledged that it’s been a fairly similar start to the season last year. However, this time around, they are all hoping for a different outcome.
“We started off our season beating Ohio State and it quickly went downhill pretty much right after that,” Thompson admitted. “So we know that this time around, yeah, it's great to be that team and we can enjoy it for now, but we still have a lot of work to do and we gotta keep our head down and stay focused.”
“We really didn’t embrace our true identity last year,” Burke said. “I think this group has already shown that we know who we are and we know what we're capable of. I think of our mentality we had last year as a good experience but ultimately a lesson learned. I think we've got the right group though to handle it better this year.”
The Bulls are currently undefeated with two games down and many more to go. This motivated team will now look to continue down this early path of success.
“Everyone has been showing up every single day and wanting to just be that one percent better and winning the day,” Bizzoni said. “That's something that's been really special for us.”
“We like to say winning the day,” Thompson said. “So to go one day at a time really helps us get to that common goal that we all have which is those bigger games.”
The team now looks to its next game on Thursday, August 29 at Cornell University.