Latrobe grad Sofia DeCerb helps James Madison women's soccer make program history with timely saves in goal

Texas State had all the momentum. After falling behind James Madison, 2-0, in the Sun Belt women’s soccer championship match, TSU rallied to tie the score 2-2 in the 55th minute.

And in the 70th minute, the Bobcats had a breakaway. All that stood in the way of the go-ahead goal was JMU’s redshirt freshman keeper Sofia DeCerb.

DeCerb, a Latrobe grad, spent her freshman season at James Madison on a redshirt. The Dukes already had an established keeper in redshirt senior Alex Blom, who, the previous season, was named the Sun Belt Goalkeeper of the Year.

So DeCerb (6-foot) took advantage of her time with Blom to soak up as much information as possible.

“Alex was always so helpful because last year I knew I was focusing on my development,” DeCerb said. “As soon as the season was over, I had multiple conversations with her, and she really helped me out and really just helped me find my confidence and with communicating with my teammates on the field.”

Coming into the 2024 season, DeCerb, despite the redshirt, was JMU’s most experienced keeper. The other two keepers on coach Josh Walters’ roster were true freshmen.

Because the two freshmen keepers didn’t arrive until the summer, DeCerb was the team’s only goalie during spring season. That, Walters said, gave her a leg up on the competition.

“Last spring, she was thrown into the fire a little bit,” said Walters, who just wrapped up his seventh season with the Dukes. “There wasn’t a replacement. It was just her, so she had to live with the good and the bad and it showed her a pathway of what she needed to work on.”

Added DeCerb: “The spring really did help a lot. I think I needed it. I got to focus on a lot of technique training. … And even though there were only a few spring games, I did get to play every single minute of them.”

Not much changed during the fall. DeCerb started all 21 matches, and out of a possible 1,890 minutes of match time, she played all but 58 minutes, 59 seconds.

She posted a record of 12-4-4 (8-0-1 in the Big South), had a 1.41 goals-against average and posted seven shutouts. Two of the shutouts came in the Sun Belt Tournament.

DeCerb credited the defenders in front of her for helping to make her job easier, and as the season progressed, she began to gain more confidence. That, she said, helped her as much as any technical tweaks she made in her game.

“I think for sure my confidence,” she said. “Really feeling like I’m good enough to play that role. When I’m at my best is when I feel confident. My distributions are better. I communicate better. So I think (confidence) floods into every other aspect of my game.”

Being a student of the game also helped her. Walters said DeCerb often is the first person to come into the office after a match to watch film.

It helped to prepare her for moments such as that Texas State breakaway in the Sun Belt final.

As Texas State’s Helen Alormenu closed in on the goal, DeCerb had to refocus. She remembered her technical training, specifically not falling back as an attacker approached but standing her ground and making her self “big.”

She also had to put the two previous goals out of her mind.

“The biggest thing was just to breathe,” she said. “I had to force myself to remember that whatever happened (on the other goals), I can’t change. It already happened, and I had to just keep moving forward.”

Alormenu took a touch past the JMU defender and fired a shot on goal. The ball headed low and to the left, and DeCerb dove and cleared the shot away for a corner kick. Threat averted.

In the 89th minute, the Dukes regained the lead on a goal by Shea Collins, but DeCerb wasn’t done saving the day. With less than 20 seconds left in regulation, Texas State’s Lucy Hart fired a close-in shot at the goal, but DeCerb made a fingertip save to preserve the win.

That set off a wild celebration as James Madison clinched its first Sun Belt Tournament title in nine years and won the regular-season and tournament titles in the same season for the first time in program history.

Walters said the two saves in the latter stages were typical of what DeCerb has delivered on a regular basis. In addition to critical saves during the run of play throughout the season, she saved four penalty kicks, including one in the Sun Belt Tournament opener, which went to PKs after the teams couldn’t break a 0-0 deadlock.

“In all of the matches in the (conference tournament), there was a save or two she had to make that allowed us to stay in it,” Walters said. “Probably in the last three or four weeks, she has come up with a big save every time.”

Few were bigger than those in the Sun Belt final.

“The expectation the whole year … was to win the Sun Belt final and make it back to the NCAA Tournament,” she said. “But until it happens, it doesn’t necessarily feel real.”

The Dukes’ stay in the NCAA Tournament was brief, a 4-1 loss to No. 10 Ohio State in the first round. But for DeCerb, her first season as a starter won’t be defined by that final match. Her future, Walters said, is promising.

“I think Sofia is at a higher place than Alex (Blom) was (at this stage of her career),” he said, “and Alex was the goalkeeper of the year in the conference. … I my mind, she could be the best goalkeeper in the conference at some point.”