Calgary product Susan Traynor has signed her letter of intent to suit up for Heat women’s soccer team, as UBC Okanagan kicks off off the team’s first venture into the highest level of university sport in Canada.
With the graduation of fifth-year midfielder Taylor Sarchet, the Heat will need to bolster their depth at the position, and Traynor looks to be just the person for the job.
Traynor has been on coach Claire Paterson’s radar for a little while now.
“Susan was a stand out from our fall ID camp in Vancouver,” Paterson said. “An athletic player, she has good individual skill and is a playmaker who sees the field well. She will be joining our returning midfield crew as they look to go up against the best players in Western Canada next season.”
Currently serving as the team captain for her team at St. Francis High School in Calgary, she is also playing in Division 1 on the Blizzard Juventus. In her spare time she has coached youth teams aged 3-12 in the Calgary area.
Very active in soccer as a player and coach, she has accumulated a wealth of experience both inside and outside of Canada. Most notably she helped win a gold medal at the 2012 Copa Del Mar tournament in San Diego and captured another gold at the provincial U-18s in 2013. She was recently awarded the 2012-13 High School Athlete of the Year award.
Traynor will be entering into a B.A. program in psychology once making the move to the Okanagan, and is excited to begin her new life as a student-athlete at UBC’s Okanagan campus.
“I chose UBCO because it has a beautiful campus and has a smaller class size,” Traynor said of her new school come the fall.
Canada West will release its soccer schedule mid-June as Traynor and the rest of the Heat women’s soccer squad kick off in September of 2014.
