Middle Tennessee women’s soccer has had plenty of players over its 29-year span, but the 2025 team has 12 seniors who changed the identity of Blue Raider soccer.  

At the time, the 2022 freshman class was the largest MTSU had, and they just needed time to learn how to manage themselves as student-athletes in a new environment, head coach Aston Rhoden said. 

“Being able to step into leadership roles, our freshman year we were timid,” midfielder Megan Carroll said. “We were coming to a program and didn’t know anyone, you can see since we’ve been here how we have grown and the core group of seniors has stayed.” 

The core group consists of seven seniors who are career Blue Raiders that have played over 16 thousand minutes, scored 35 goals and helped MTSU win a Conference USA playoff game in 2024, the team’s first since 2021 before any of the current players were on the roster. 

As the leadership role grew for each player so did the success of the team, going from a 2-12-3 record to an 8-5-3 record this year with two games remaining. If Middle Tennessee is able to win out, it would be the first double-digit win record since 2018.  

“When you look at this senior group, pretty much every one of them can lead the team,” Rhoden said. “They can now control their own performance and once they can do that, they can help others do the same.” 

The senior class has a wide range of experience from forward Idun Kvaale playing every game to players battling back from injury and some with only a handful of match appearances.  

“They have all made strides in their own personal ways where you have got Idun [Kvaale] who has developed a really good voice on the field and freshman year she was extremely quiet,” Rhoden said. “Megan [Carroll] and Emma [Pettersen] have started leading by example; you have Emily McGrain and Gabby [Shegota] that lead through their own personal heart and compassion that they bring.”  

Five current seniors joined the Blue Raiders part of the way through their college career with Hannah Delaney, Xemina Jauregui and Emma Brown starting games for MTSU.  

“We recruited them because from a soccer standpoint, they had the qualities that we needed, and they played in systems that were similar to ours so the soccer piece of it wasn’t hard in terms of integrating them into the way we like to play but we also did enough work to know that they were people who value system was similar to ours,” Rhoden said.  

The biggest change that transfers bring is their experience in a different environment that gives insight to our current team on the resources that can be taken for granted, Rhoden said.   

The growth that the seniors have made is crucial when it comes to the 2025 roster. Middle Tennessee with its dozen seniors, and 11 freshmen combined for 85% of the entire roster. 

“We create the culture of family,” Carroll said. “It doesn’t matter if you are a senior, freshman or transfer, we are all here for each other and at the end of the day we hope that the family aspect can carry through.” 

The coaching staff hopes that the discipline of this senior class rubs off on the younger players, as this class was never one that had academic problems and worked really hard to be active quality members of society, Rhoden said.  

Middle Tennessee has two games remaining as they look to make the Conference USA tournament for a second year in a row. The Blue Raiders take on the University of Texas-El Paso for senior day on Sunday, Oct. 19 at 1 p.m. at Dean A. Hayes Track and Soccer Stadium.