By Daniel Wallace
Sports Writer
With two goals and two assists this season, sophomore midfielder Karlee Summey has taken full advantage of the chance she has been given. Summey has appeared in all 12 games for the Bears and had the game-winning goal 45 seconds into overtime Sunday against Weber State.
Junior midfielder Lisa Sliwinski was quick to mention Summey’s inspiring attitude and the mentality she brings to the team.
“I’ve really been admiring her attitude lately,” she said. “She makes the most of the opportunities on the field and she doesn’t complain when she doesn’t get the opportunities.”
Head coach Marci Jobson said Summey has matured as a player within the past year and believes she will become better and more effective for the program in the coming years. Jobson said Summey has a wide range of skills and has greatly improved, but not just on offense.
“Summey’s really dangerous on the attack,” she said. “She’s very good technically on the ball. She’s a very good passer. She can shoot the ball very well. She’s also become a better defensive player.”
Junior defender Carlie Davis says she considers Summey her best friend and admires how devoted she is in all areas of life, not just soccer.
“She’s really passionate,” she said. “She loves life and loves people. She puts everything she has into all of her friendships and teammates in soccer, too. She goes all in. She’s pretty passionate.”
On the field, Summey gives the team a much-needed spark, Davis said. She noted how important her best friend is to the team, whether she is on the field or not.
“She brings a level of energy halfway through the half that we can’t really get from anywhere else,” Davis said. “Obviously she makes a lot of difference in the games, because she scores a lot of goals.”
Summey, who is from Keller started playing soccer at the age of 3. She played soccer and basketball her whole life until freshman year of high school when she had to choose between playing soccer or basketball. At 5 feet 4 inches tall, she thought soccer might be the better choice; it helped that she had already developed a love for the sport.
She said she has not always lived and breathed soccer, however. For nearly four months in the summer before her junior year of high school, Summey decided to quit playing soccer.
“It was just a low point in my life,” she said. “I wasn’t enjoying it and didn’t see it in my future.”
She couldn’t stay away for long though, and her coach her inspired to come back and play for the select team she had been playing for in high school. Summey is thankful she made the choice to come back to soccer and through that absence saw that her life was in greater hands.
“The Lord just had it all worked out for me,” she said. “It’s honestly been the greatest thing ever that I came back and played.”
Summey is a psychology major with a minor in religion. She is involved in Fellowship of Christian Athletes at Baylor and said she has a passion for children. She plans to pursue a masters’ degree in counseling and become a child play therapist.
