For goalie and senior accounting major Kayla Lipston, playing for Central’s women’s soccer team the last three years has been a blessing. Recruited out of Decatur high school in Federal Way by head coach Michael Farrand, Lipston has enjoyed the starting goalie position since her sophomore year.

In her first year starting, Lipston had 85 saves, saving 79 percent of the shots-on-goal.

Last year, she started in all 14 games and improved to a career high 84.6 percent save rate, as well as a career high of .88 goals per game in the GNAC standings.

Lipston now ranks second in Central history, allowing only 1.11 goals per game in her career, In 2013 she had a total of 184 saves in the 14 games that she started.

Lipston attributes her success as goalie to the team, saying it all starts with the defenders. Last week, she was nominated for GNAC Defensive Player of the Week.

“It felt really good because it wasn’t just me who earned that reward,” Lipston said. “It was my team who helped me. I have been looking to have a defense that plays well in big games.”

With players graduating and moving on, the Wildcats have had to develop new talent in the defensive positions with many of their current players being freshmen.

Last year, Lipston had 66 cumulative saves on the season. As of hitting the half-way point of this season, Lipston has already accrued 72 saves.

For  Farrand, this increase in saves can be explained by the development of new players and getting the team’s “groove” back after shifting players around.

“We have a conference where the top goalkeeper of the region comes out of our conference,” Farrand said. “Kayla is one of the best goalkeepers in the GNAC. In almost every game we’ve given up a goal but she always comes up with big saves.”

Farrand saw potential in Lipston when he first saw her play during her junior year of high school. While scouting, Farrand noticed Lipston as a potential star prospect for the team.

“She was great and competitive,” Farrand said. “Her size and athleticism were things we needed in order to improve our goalkeeping. Training has been a real success for Kayla.”

Last year, however, Lipston suffered a partially torn MCL in her leg that forced her to sit out for four games. Despite playing through the injury when it initially happened, after Lipston was checked out, the scope of the situation became clear.

“I was hoping she wasn’t seriously hurt,” Farrand said. “[After examination] we knew at that point it was a serious injury. She rehabbed and worked hard to get back to the goal in the playoffs.”

After the Wildcats’ 2-1 win in overtime over the Montana State Billings Yellowjackets on Sept. 28, 2014, the day of Lipston’s injury, the team gave up five goals in four games.

After Lipston’s return, the team only relinquished five goals in seven games, an average of .72 goals per game. Lipston also had three shutouts in a row.

“I was just more worried about how I was going to get back and be at the same level of play that I had left at,” Lipston said. “I was worried about how it would effect the team. I worked my butt off to get back as fast as I could.”

For Kayla’s father, Robert, it was never a matter of if Kayla would recover and get back out onto the field, but when. For him, there’s nothing that Kayla can’t do if she puts her mind to it.

“She’s grown so much as an athlete, as a person, a daughter, and has grown to be an amazing young lady,” Robert Lipston said. “I’m most proud of her determination and relentless drive to improve and bring her game to the next level with her attitude.”

Lipston said that playing goalie comes with an enormous senses of responsibility.

“I like having all of the pressure and weight of each game on my shoulders,” Lipston said.

However, there are some aspects of the position she doesn’t care for.

“People only remember your mistakes, not necessarily how you did the whole game,” Lipston said.

Luckily, she hasn’t had too many games for fans to complain about, with five shutouts already for the year. This could be attributed to her pre-game ritual, which has stayed constant since finding the sweet spot after some trial and error.

“First, I have my assistant coach tie my left shoe and my goalkeeper coach tie my right shoe,” Lipston said. “When I tie my shoes they come untied, so first, my goalkeeper coach was tying both shoes and we lost, then my assistant coach tied both and we lost, then they both tied each and we’ve been doing alright.”

Regardless of the teams’  success, Lipston will be graduating this spring and plans to work somewhere in the accounting world. She is unsure whether or not soccer will be in her future, but she’d like to continue to play.

Robert Lipston said Kayla originally planned on becoming an ESPN announcer after high school. He says her willpower has opened up a lot of opportunities.

Whatever Lipston does in her future, she will leave a legacy at Central that few will be able to follow. Farrand acknowledged that it will be difficult to replace such an exceptional player.