Hello……We’re The Memphis Tigers Introduction Campaign

With all of the movement from conference to conference by Division I universities, it is often difficult to know just who is who.
The University of Memphis, which officially became a member of the American Athletic Conference on July 1, has taken a novel approach.
The Tigers are introducing themselves, one sport at a time. Included have been the men’s and women’s soccer programs.
The Memphis men’s program fielded its first varsity team in 1982 and going into 2013 season, the program’s 31st, the Tigers have a 297-245-54 record. Memphis will seek its 300th win in its first year in the American Athletic Conference.
Over the years, Memphis has won three conference tournament championships. The first was 1986 when the Tigers took the Metro tournament and in 1993 they won the Great Midwest tournament title. Memphis was the Conference USA champion in 2004[show_disconnected][show_to accesslevel=’Subscriber’].
The Tigers have prodced seven CoSIDDA Capital One Academic All-Americans, one of whom was named NSCAA Scholar All-American. The Tigers had had 27 student-athletes earn NSCAA All-Region honors, 21 coming under current head coach Richie Grant.
Grant has also had two NSCA All-Americans in Mark Sherrod (2011) and Dayton O’Brien (2004).
The Memphis men moved to their home field at the Mike Rose Soccer Complex in 2001, and in 11 seasons at that facility they have posted a 61-31-0 record. Last season, the Tigers set a home attendance record of 1,101 in the season opener against Wisconsin.
Memphis Tigers Women
The Memphis women’s program began in 1995 and 2013 will mark #19 since they took the field for the first time.
Overall, the Tigers, who also play their home games at the Mike Rose Soccer Complex, are 191-154-20 in women’s soccer, and have won five conference championships.
Those were five consecutive conference championships from 2007-2011.
Memphis has seen nine players earn conference Player of the Year honors. Christabel Oduro was a two-time Conference USA Offensive Player of the Year, while Ashley Berra, Vendula Strnadova and Shoko Mikami also received that honor.
Lizzy Simonin earned the Conference USA Defensive Player of the Year for two straight seasons, and Kelsey Bakker received that award in 2009. Strnadova was a two-time Conference USA Midfielder of the Year from 2008/2010).
Berra was the first of five players in program history to earn All-America honors. She was selected All-America in 2009 by the National Soccer Coaches Association of America. Strnadova was selected in 2010, and the following year three Tigers, Simonin, Elise Kuhar-Pitts and Oduro were named to All-America teams.
The 2011 season, under current head coach Brooks Monaghan, saw the Memphis women post an unbeaten regular season (18-0-1) climbing as high as #3 nationally in the top-25 polls. Since 2007, the Tigers have posted a 95-29-8 record. Monaghan has been the women’s head coach for 14 seasons.
Winning five conference championships has earned Memphis five postseasons berths in the NCAA Division I tournament. During that outstanding 2011 season, the Tigers hosted first and second/third round playoff games at Mike Rose.
Memphis will enter American Athletic Conference play in August with five current players who have had busy soccer summers that will conclude in the USL W-League’s championship weekend at IMG Academy in Bradenton, FL.
Junior Kylie Davis, sophomore Marissa Duguay and incoming freshmen Valerie Sanderson, Maryse Bard-Martel, McKenzie Bricker (Collierville, Tenn.) are members of the Laval Comets, a team based in Quebec, Canada, which is the top seeded team in the W-League’s 2013 final four.
Davis, Sanderson and Bard-Martel were recently invited to participate in Canada’s Womens National Excel camp which includes members of the Canada Women’s U20 roster.