A-State soccer’s all-time leading goal scorer has earned a chance to go pro in the National Women’s Soccer League.
Red Wolves forward Sarah Sodoma had her playing rights claimed by NWSL expansion team Racing Louisville FC the club announced Jan. 21. The NWSL is the highest division of women’s soccer in the United States.
Sodoma actually had a chance of getting drafted by Louisville in the NWSL draft Jan. 13 after the club expressed interest in drafting the St. Louis native toward the beginning of January. Although the club did not end up drafting A-State’s star goal scorer, the club was able to claim her playing rights after the draft.
“(Leading up to the announcement) it was exciting,” Sodoma said. “I had never really realized that was something that was possible for me. Obviously I don’t go to a huge school, I’m not in one of the bigger conferences. I just figured they would be more interested in those kinds of players.”
After the NWSL draft, teams around the league are able to claim undrafted players’ playing rights. This means Sodoma belongs to Racing Louisville FC and in 2022 Sodoma will get a chance to earn a contract at the club.
“Just excitement (was running through my mind about getting an opportunity at the next level) and there’s a lot of unknowns to it,” Sodoma said. “Obviously I still have a lot of work to do to actually get a shot at playing. So there are some nerves behind it but mostly excitement just because it’s a huge opportunity for me and something I always thought about as a little girl.”
Due to COVID-19 giving collegiate athletes another year of eligibility, Sodoma will be coming back in the fall of 2021 to play in another season for A-State before heading to Louisville in 2022.
During this spring season and in the fall, Sodoma will look to keep improving her game to get ready for the next level. Sodoma is in contact with the Racing Louisville coaching staff weekly to talk about what she needs to work on in her game.
“We’re keeping open lines of communication on what they want me to improve on and what I want to improve on,” Sodoma said. “So I’m going to kind of go off what they say to work on. I think my focus right now is refining my first touches, figuring out what the best runs to make up top will be, making sure when I get shots they’re on goal and producing good opportunities for myself and other people.”
A-State head soccer coach Brian Dooley emphasized how important this season at A-State will be for Sodoma.
“You get Sarah to play in the spring and Sarah to play in the fall with a higher level of motivation than just being your last semester of soccer ever to being your last opportunity to get better to make a professional team,” Dooley said. “I think that’s going to bring Sarah to an even better level.”
In her time at A-State, Dooley said Sodoma’s shooting has become more deadly and more powerful as she has become more confident in her finishing. He also highlighted that her tactical understanding and her run making has gotten better and better.
That being said, one side of her game Sodoma does need to work on before heading to the next level, according to Dooley, is her aerial and heading ability.
“That’s going to be something that she’s going to have to become stronger with to play at the next level,” Dooley said. “You have to be able to head the ball to goal. Otherwise it becomes a weakness.”
Dooley has had some conversations with Racing Louisville himself and noted that over the coming year A-State could help in the process by sending the club film of Sodoma’s performances along with many other things like biotesting through GPS and heart rate monitoring.
“Anything that they ask of us, we’ll try to do,” Dooley said. “I’d love for her an opportunity to make the roster.”
Racing Louisville is set to compete in its first ever NWSL season in the spring of 2021 and the expansion team looks to build a culture of family around the team. Louisville also places a heavy focus on youth development and building from scratch.
“I really like the coaches and their philosophy that they’re putting behind the team they’re growing,” Sodoma said. “They told me a lot about how they want their team to be run like a family and how they want to get to know their players on a personal level to be able to develop them. They think that personal lives transfer over to soccer, which I agree with.”
Dooley drew parallels between the A-State program when Sodoma arrived in Jonesboro and how Racing Louisville is about to begin its life in the NWSL. Sodoma could really fit in at Louisville as the franchise grows.
“When Sarah decided to come here, we were a new staff with essentially a program that didn’t have a significant amount of history behind it,” Dooley said. “You draw a parallel with her class coming in that maybe consider us kind of an expansion team. Her growth, along with the growth of our program started to really blend and started to really accentuate her abilities. Maybe this is something that could be a similar situation (at Louisville).”
The club also boasts a soccer specific stadium, Lynn Family Stadium, shared by Racing Louisville and Louisville City FC, a team in the USL Championship (the second division of men’s soccer in the United States).
The club broke ground on a brand new training facility in August that will be shared by both Racing Louisville and Louisville City FC that is set to open this spring. The facility will have a total of seven different pitches, stadium lighting and other amenities like locker rooms, gym areas, a dining hall and offices.
Sodoma is the first player from A-State to get a chance in the NWSL. She hopes that her opportunity will inspire players on her team and players across that country that don’t go to the biggest schools to know they have a shot at the highest level of the professional game.
“In the back of your mind as a player now, you have to understand that if you do the right things, you perform, you’ll get recognized and get an opportunity,” Dooley said. “It really opens the door for everyone who might not have the chance to go to a Power Five school. Not that that’s the only path you can take, but now if you do things the right way you get noticed.”
In her time as a Red Wolf, Sodoma’s tactical understanding of the game has improved and she highlighted how her coaches at A-State have spent time with players individually to really help them with their development.
Dooley admits when he first recruited Sodoma he didn’t know he had a pro quality player on his hands, but he said he’s not surprised either.
When Sodoma first arrived in Jonesboro, Dooley said he didn’t really know which Sodoma would show up, the one who sets up opportunities or the one who scores. In club soccer back in St. Louis, Sodoma showed she could do both.
Dooley and his coaching staff really started to see they had a next level player when the Red Wolves scrimmaged Pine Bluff Sodoma’s freshman year in the Student Activities Center. Sodoma scored two goals in a 6-0 victory.
“We’re on the sideline looking at each other like ‘OK,’” Dooley said. “She just did it in some explosive way. We knew she was a good player from practice and recruiting but we saw that in a game and we were like, ‘OK this might be something.’ Then she had a tremendous freshman year.”
Flash forward to her senior year and Sodoma finished the 2020 fall season leading A-State all-time with 29 goals to her name and ranking second in assists all-time with 15.
“She’s one of those players, everytime she gets the ball,” Dooley said, “something happens and she’s fun to watch!”
Despite these outstanding numbers, Sodoma said she still needs to make sure to keep her confidence high as she gets ready for the jump to the pros.
“I think it’ll help a lot if I keep my confidence up,” Sodoma said. “You would think that I’m more of a confident player than I am but I think I need to work on my confidence more, like believing in myself. Especially at that level, I’m going to need to be more confident because I’m going to be going in against people that are most likely going to be better than me. I need to go in with a strong mentality thinking I can do it and not just be scared.”
A-State and Louisville fans could see a Red Wolf icon suiting up in lavender in the highest division of women’s soccer in 2022 as Sarah Sodoma looks to continue her storied, young career on the pitch.
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