The 2025 season has featured a youth movement for the San Diego State women’s soccer team.
Replacing 11 graduating seniors meant the Aztecs had to form a new identity —and fast. The club’s lineup is composed mainly of underclassmen, who have stepped right into playing prominent roles on the pitch. Twenty of 25 players on the SDSU roster are freshmen or sophomores, defining the inexperienced yet motivated 2025 Aztecs squad.
The young Aztec players receive regular playing time, which has allowed for immediate development and experience at the start of many of their collegiate careers.
“I feel like it’s helped us developmentally, big time,” said freshman goalkeeper Kailey Carlen.
In her first season at the Mesa, Carlen immediately stepped in as the club’s starting goalkeeper, playing in every game this season for the Aztecs. Her instant importance to the team has allowed for tremendous growth in year one.
“[I] didn’t expect there to be so much adversity,” she said. “But overall, I feel like being there for one another has definitely helped, and just doing my job the best that I can and still learning every day.”
Head coach Mike Friesen is impressed with the almost seamless transition of his young players into another competitive season for the Scarlet and Black.
“From a playing standpoint, we’ve been really good,” Friesen said. “Going back to looking at the entire year of how we’ve played in each game, we’ve been on top of the game a lot of time. We’ve led in our conference matches, seven of our nine, after 80 minutes.”
A strong team chemistry has helped the young Aztecs grow together throughout the season and build relationships that have led to game-time results.
“It’s not only on the field, but also off the field where you feel like it’s one unit and we’re all really good friends off the field,” said freshman defender Mia Hambro Svendsen. “I think that helps us on the field, too.”
Off the field, bonding has helped the newcomers adapt to playing collegiate-level soccer, on top of the already huge adjustment of beginning college life.
“I think part of it is they’re going through some shared experiences of being young, making some mistakes and under pressure for the first time,” Friesen said. “I think one of the things that everybody struggles with when they get to college is how much practice and how many games come at them so fast, on top of being away from home for the first time, some of them halfway across the world, new living situations, all those kinds of things.”
Part of what makes the club’s locker room chemistry so special is mentorship from older players that trickled down to the underclassmen.
“I feel like there’s also key players that definitely help us that are older,” Carlen said. “For example, Lex [Ocampo], Katie [Senn] and Grace [Goins] are big, big helpers ‘cause they’ve been here the longest. So, I feel like having those players help us out and guide us towards that direction of camaraderie.”
Being such a young team comes with its challenges. The Aztecs have had their fair share of learning moments, particularly in managing games and holding onto late-game leads.
“I think that’s the part we’ve struggled with the last three or four weeks, is when the game becomes exceptionally chaotic and the ball’s bouncing and being smashed everywhere, is, how do we find ways to calm that down?” Friesen said. “So I think they’ve had to learn some of those hard lessons. And it hasn’t just been our youngest players, but all of our players finding ways to manage the game.”
Hambro Svendsen echoed the challenge of keeping composure when the game becomes intense.
“The first 10 minutes and also the last 10, that’s probably the most chaotic and also stressful times of a game,” she said.
Through those challenges, the Aztecs have developed into a more ready and experienced team this season. Prior to the final regular-season game against New Mexico, SDSU sits sixth in the Mountain West standings, in position for a spot in the conference tournament.
A season of development has given the Aztecs the confidence that they belong on the pitch and can compete with anybody in the Mountain West.
“I do definitely think we’re ready for the tournament,” Friesen said. “I, personally, would not want to play us out of all the teams, just based on how much we’ve had the ball over the course of the conference season.”
Beyond the upcoming conference tournament, the 2025 season has laid the groundwork for the next generation of leaders in SDSU women’s soccer.
“I mean, it’s inevitable that one day we’re gonna grow up and we’ll have to help out the freshmen,” Carlen said. “So I think it’s a really good learning experience for us, so that we know what to bring to the table for when we do have those incoming freshmen and they look at us as leaders.”
