In her heart of heart, Rachel Nuzzolese is convinced she could kick for a college football team.
"It's not going to happen,'' coach Tony da Luz of the Wake Forest women's soccer team said. "I'm not sharing."
Now that he has Nuzzolese fully back from a torn knee ligament, da Luz isn't about to lose the services of one of the best players on the best team in school history.
The Deacons will play Duke at 7:30 p.m. on Friday in Kennesaw, Ga., in the semifinals of the College Cup, and Nuzzolese, a 5-foot-8 sophomore forward from Upper Brookville, N.Y., played a big role in getting them there.
Although not fully up to speed until late October, Nuzzolese has contributed 11 goals and seven assists to the Deacons' run to a school-record 18 victories. Sophomore Katie Stengel broke her own school records with 19 goals and 46 points in a season, but Nuzzolese ranks sixth in both single-season categories.
"She's had a great year," da Luz said. "By her standards, she would probably like to score more goals. But by other humans — normal humans — that's a pretty good year, and we're not done.
"We've got a couple of more games left."
To find the source of Nuzzolese's athleticism, one doesn't have to look far. Her mother, Joyce, was a high school All-American in the hurdles, and her father, Michael, played football at Louisville from 1979 through 1982.
"He was a center, MVP, all that stuff," Nuzzolese said. "My dad was legit.
"I think I got his legs. He has huge legs."
Nuzzolese had never kicked a football until two radio personalities at WFAN in New York, Boomer Esiason and Craig Carton, began cracking on female athletes. A challenge was arranged in which Carton batted against a high school pitcher in fast-pitch softball and attempted to outkick a high school girl from 40 yards away.
Nuzzolese, then a student at St. Anthony's High School, carried her gender's banner in football.
"I sort of started practicing a little bit, and I realized it was kind of easy — 'I can do this,' " Nuzzolese said. "My first one that I hit was 53 (yards). I was like, 'Maybe I could go NFL.' "
She said she received no instruction.
"They gave me a bag of balls, and I just teed it up on that little thingy and kicked it," Nuzzolese said.
And that was good enough for Nuzzolese to drill the 40-yarder in front of 14,000 fans on a locally televised showdown. Carton, for the record, came up about 10 yards short.
A prized recruit, Nuzzolese paid immediate dividends last season by becoming the first Wake Forest player to score goals in her first four games. She started the first 11 before tearing the anterior cruciate ligament in her left leg.
She rehabilitated diligently and was cleared for this season in July, a month before practice began. However, it wasn't until the 17th game, against Clemson, that she felt the knee was 100 percent healthy.
"At the beginning of the season, it was sore here or there, but now I don't think about it," she said. "I don't favor it. It feels fine."
In the nine games since Wake Forest played Clemson, Nuzzolese has scored five goals and recorded six assists.
"She's feeling super confident in her knee and her leg, and she doesn't think about it anymore," da Luz said. "And once Rachel gets confident, she's pretty hard to stop.
"She thinks she can score anytime. That's her mentality."
Email
Facebook
Google
Twitter
Favorites
More
Advertisement