WATERFORD GRAD KATIE SCHOEPFER AND MOM MARY JANE
If not for an assist from her mom, Katie Schoepfer may have pursued a different career path other than soccer. Schoepfer was contemplating quitting the Olympic Development Program in her first season. She didn't know anybody on the team. She asked her mom, Mary Jane, to call the ODP coach to tell him that she didn't want to play. Her mom pushed back on that idea. "She said if I was going to quit, I had to call the coach myself," Schoepfer said. "I was too scared to call the coach so I stuck it out. That one decision grew me the most as a player because it was that coming of age moment. I had to go make friends and be comfortable in this uncomfortable situation and figure out how to play soccer. "I don't know where I would have ended up if she let me quit or if she made that phone call for me. I'm not sure if I would have ever gone back to ODP. And I don't know if I would have had the same career as I did. I could have been done with soccer and moved on." Schoepfer called it the most influential thing that her mom ever did for her.
She's built an impressive soccer resume. As a player, she set the state high school scoring record with 157 goals and 47 assists at Waterford and earned All-American honors, starred at Penn State, competed on United States national teams at the Under-17, Under-20 and Under-23 levels and played professionally for seven years. She is a member of the Connecticut Soccer Hall of Fame. After assistant coaching stints at Boston University and Holy Cross, Schoepfer is the director of coaching for South Shore Select Soccer in Massachusetts. Her mom has been there for every step on the journey. "She had a lot of influence on my sports career," Schoepfer said. "The most important thing for me is she let it be my thing. She was just that constant support system for me. She listened to me complain, celebrated when I was happy, but her biggest thing was she just wanted me to do it and enjoy it. And as long as I was having fun, she was happy to drive me all around the state of Connecticut when I was a kid."
— Gavin Keefe