Picture Butte’s Leusink commits to the Kodiaks
Coming off a bronze medal-winning season, Lethbridge College Kodiaks women’s soccer head coach Sean Carey is already hard at work bolstering next year’s lineup with local talent.
His first signing for 2023-24 comes in the form of centre-back Abigail Leusink, a Lethbridge Football Club (LFC) product who hails from Picture Butte.
“I’ve been chasing Abby for quite a while, so it was nice to get her to commit,” says Carey. “She’s a full multi-sport athlete and she’s very good at basketball and volleyball, too, so we weren’t sure which way she was going to go. She’s played at quite a high level with LFC for several years now with (former Kodiaks soccer head coach) Mike Racz. She’s been coached well and she’s definitely a big piece for our future. I know other schools were chasing her, so it’s huge for Abigail to choose us when she had lots of options.”
Carey says it’s exciting to develop and strengthen the pipeline between LFC and the Kodiaks, adding players are recognizing Lethbridge College as a great destination to continue playing competitive soccer while getting a high-quality education.
“There’s a bunch of quality LFC players coming through this year. Getting Abigail is huge and is the first domino to fall, and I hope there’s four or five who follow her. These local recruits give us such a great base to build our team.”
For Leusink, getting a chance to experience the Kodiaks team culture at various ID camps was huge to making her feel comfortable about committing to Lethbridge College.
“I went to an ID camp a few years ago and I really liked how Sean (Carey) made the Lethbridge girls
feel welcome and showed a lot of interest in us,” says Leusink. “It just felt really good and I really like the team environment.”
While she likes to create offensive opportunities for her teammates, the newest Kodiak says she’ll be looking to make her biggest impact on the defensive side of the ball.
“I really like carrying the ball forward and trying to create goal scoring opportunities, but my favourite thing about the game is just playing defensively, especially chasing people and stealing the ball back.”
Training camp may not start until August, but Leusink says she’s already looking forward to adjusting to life as a postsecondary student-athlete.
“I’m excited to make a whole new group of friends and moving on to living on my own, playing postsecondary soccer and working towards a future in psychology.”
Leusink will enrol in Lethbridge College’s General Arts and Science program as she builds towards her