The origin of the word "legacy" dates all the way back to the late 14th century, meaning: "a body of persons sent on a mission." This body is unfit to accomplish its mission and will ultimately fail if, and only if, the broken pieces are left dragging in the dirt, if some pieces are trying to carry the weight all on their own, and if any piece has not fully surrendered to the mission with reckless abandon.

Every drill at practice executed at one hundred percent, every encouraging squeeze of a teammate's shoulder, and every extra minute we take to pick up a wad of ankle tape off the locker room floor; each moment lays down one more brick in the legacy we are building from the ground up.

Coach Samar reminds us, "a legacy is not about what you take with you once your four years are completed … it's about what you leave behind for the ones coming after you." Why do our seniors Britta Widenhouse, Tori Danielson, and Ashley Hollander, who have only a few games left in their college careers, choose to show up every day and leave everything they have on the field? Because they now realize that they will leave a strong foundation built on our team values for the underclassmen who are rising up to step into their place.

We are given an opportunity to place another brick in the foundation of our legacy on Wednesday against Brevard College. Our team is aiming for a fourth straight conference win. However, in the first twenty-four minutes, we come out flatter than a pair of cleats lazily planted in the ground because we underestimate Brevard's ability. As moments of our season constantly remind us as we grow, no matter what, we are our own leaders and must never expect to have anything handed to us. We must build our own foundation. We must leave our own legacy.

It takes the realization that persistent Brevard is not about to hand us the win, after they sneak in two attempts on our goal, plus some necessary reprimands from our frustrated Coach, to make us switch back into fourth gear and up the intensity.

Within the next fifteen minutes, Krystal Goss and Allie Waters fire off the attack by scoring three beautiful goals.

We maintain our intensity level and end the game with a 3-0 victory, our biggest lead thus far this season. We only do this after the dangerous first twenty-four minutes where we define a culture we will never accept, the culture of entitlement. We realized that we did not operate as one body striving to accomplish a mission. Our team learns that we should never expect to come out flat against a hungry opponent and expect the win to be handed to us, the experience is an opportunity we use as we lay one more brick down towards shaping our legacy.

The chance to take one step closer to accomplishing our mission arrives with our windy home match against Tusculum Saturday at 1 p.m. Before the game, each player shares one thing she is most thankful for, one thing, which if taken away, would be devastating. Most of us say some form of "family." Of course our biological family, but immediately following is the family shouldered tight around the slightly weather-beaten black and gold "Heart."

We decide we will win this battle for our family. We have our family made up of parents, guardians, and siblings dressed in neon-yellow "Game Day" shirts lined up to send us off into battle at our stadium entrance. And we also have the family that stretches all the way from our bench, across the starting eleven, and back to our coaches, pacing up and down the sideline. We are one body with one mission and today regardless of the final score another brick will be planted.

For one hundred and eight minutes, we battle. Kaitlyn Neipp holds us together by snatching multiple crosses out of the brisk wind and we struggle with communication at first during set pieces and 50-50 balls, but a brilliant moment of communication to execute a takeover from Joelle Purinton and Britta Widenhouse opens our eyes to endless possibilities if we just open our mouths! Jessica Kleinberg represents everything we just expressed about the importance of family when her twin goes down with an injury and Jessica picks up an unprecedented intensity and drive to go forward.

With the score 0-0 at the buzzer we immediately dive back in for two ten-minute golden goal overtimes. Fatigue is forgotten and our body of eleven relentlessly hammers Tusculum's box and with cross after cross in front of the goal mouth as our anticipation mounts while the clock dwindles.

At the 108th minute, Krystal Goss breaks away with a great chance and is taken down at the edge of the Tusculum box. The foul earns us a penalty kick with two minutes remaining. The bench holds its breath and we put our toes on the sideline, ready to sprint out on the field the moment ball hits net. Allie Waters coolly steps up to take the PK, and right as the referee's whistle goes to his mouth our goalkeeper trainer Andy Barth whispers "It's done."

The whistle blows, Allie shoots and we've won. Our entire sideline rushes towards our field and we all come together celebrating this monumental victory.

Coach tells us afterwards "the whole time I was telling myself: 'win, tie, or lose, tell them you are proud.'" We never have and never will measure our pride by the final score on the board, but by whether or not we performed in such a manner that adheres to our values and our legacy, that "body of persons sent on a mission." Today we did just that.

At the beginning of the season, the Anderson University women's soccer team was picked to finish ninth in the SAC coaches' preseason poll. As of October 16, with an overall record of 8-6, we sit at third place in the 2011 SAC standings. One more brick placed.

The team would like to personally thank the Widenhouse family for our wonderful team meal prior to Mars Hill, the Waters family for our pregame meal on Wednesday prior to our Brevard game, the Uldrick family for providing a wonderful pregame breakfast for us Saturday before our Tusculum game and to all the parents who worked hard to have an excellent lunch for us after the match and put together our Game Day shirts. Thank you so much for your unconditional support and love