NMSU women open at ASU in exhibition

Under first-year head caoch Rob Baarts, New Mexico State’s women’s soccer program gets the 2018 season going today with an exhibition game at Arizona State in Tempe. Kickoff is at 4 p.m.

NMSU returns eight starters from last year’s squad, which went 9-10-2 overall and 3-3-1 in the Western Athletic Conference. This year’s Aggies are picked to finish sixth in the nine-team league.

Senior Aileen Galicia , the program’s career goal-scoring leader with 22, was named preseason All-WAC, and the Aggies return 64 percent of their scoring from 2017.

Other returning starters are goalkeeper Dmitri Fong, who was secondteam All-WAC last year as a freshman with five shutouts, Audriana Chavez, Samantha Afonso, Rebecca Mazzie, Micaela Milavec, Kelly Burton and Sarina Stockton.

NMSU signed 10 freshmen, and transfers Kaitlyn May (Paradise Valley Community College) and Emma Smith (Linfield College) are expected to make an immediate impact.

NMSU has 15 in-state players on its roster and two from El Paso.

Baarts spent the last two seasons as an assistant at San Jose State, which won the Mountain West regular-season championship. He also was an assistant at his alma mater, Portland University, when it won an NCAA title in 2005.

Arizona State is coming off a 5-11-3 season, 2-7-2 in Pac-12 play.

The Aggies start regular-season play with a three-game trip starting Friday at San Diego State.