Sky Blue FC is looking for players with the dream of playing soccer at the professional level. The NJ/NY franchise in Women's Professional Soccer (WPS) announced today dates for tryouts for the 2009 season.
Sky Blue FC will conduct two separate tryouts - open tryouts and invitation-only tryouts. These tryouts will be held in conjunction on February 25th and 26th at the GoodSports USA Facility in Wall, NJ. All participants must preregister for the tryouts.
Scouts from Sky Blue FC's W-League amateur affiliate, the Hudson Valley Quickstrike Lady Blues, will also be in attendance. The Lady Blues will serve as a feeder/identification program for the Sky Blue FC professional team. The teams will train together during the season and the staffs of both teams will share evaluation and development strategies.
Sky Blue FC – the NJ/NY entry into Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS) – announced today that the club has secured agreements in principle with Australians Sarah Walsh and Collette McCallum for the 2009 season.
Both Walsh and McCallum are expected to be in uniform when Sky Blue FC kicks off its first season in WPS. The team will host the Los Angeles Sol on April 5, 2009 at TD Bank Ballpark in Bridgewater, NJ in its debut match. (888-SBFC-TIX - TICKETS)
The Australia Women’s National Team members are the first two internationals to come to terms with Sky Blue FC for the WPS inaugural season. Sky Blue FC obtained the negotiating rights to Walsh in the WPS International Draft in on September 24, 2008. The Aussie forward was the club’s first-round selection and the seventh-overall pick. A central midfielder, McCallum was picked up by Sky Blue FC as a post-draft discovery player two days later.
Sky Blue FC - the NJ/NY entry into Women's Professional Soccer (WPS) - announced today that the team will open its first-ever season at home on Sunday, April 5, 2009. Sky Blue FC will take on the Los Angeles Sol at TD Bank Ballpark in Bridgewater, NJ in its first-ever game.
Sky Blue FC will call Rutgers University's Yurcak Field in Piscataway, NJ its home for the 2009 season but the team's home opener will be moved to TD Bank Ballpark to accommodate the larger crowd expected for the franchise debut. TD Bank Ballpark is the home of the Somerset Patriots baseball team in the Atlantic League and will seat approximately 7,000 fans when configured for soccer.
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The next 50 Sky Blue FC season ticket packages sold will include a bonus general admission ticket to see Sky Blue FC take on the LA Sol on April 5th at TD Bank Ballpark in the home opener. Call 888-SBFC-TIX or CLICK HERE to take advantage of this one-time offer.
The complete Sky Blue FC schedule will be announced in late January along with the rest of the WPS slate. Fox Soccer Channel's national television schedule will follow the league schedule announcement.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ABOUT THE SKY BLUE FC HOME OPENER ...
Today, global sportlifestyle brand PUMA and Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS) announced an exclusive partnership making PUMA an official founding partner of WPS and an official sponsor of all WPS franchises. The multi-year partnership makes PUMA the official sport and lifestyle apparel, footwear and equipment supplier of WPS, including the official WPS Match Ball. In addition to on-field performance wear, PUMA will outfit the athletes and teams at all WPS-related events, activities and WPS appearances in sportlifestyle apparel. This partnership kicks off with the inaugural season in April 2009 and will see PUMA collaborating with WPS to enhance the game of women’s soccer and will act as the foundation in the PUMA Women’s category.
Fanta Cooper
With Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS) holding the first of its two potential player combines this weekend in California, the Sky Blue FC coaching staff will be seeking to secure the final pieces to the team’s roster for the league’s inaugural season. Head Coach and General Manager Ian Sawyers and newly-appointed Assistant Coach Kelly Lindsey will be in San Diego from today through Sunday to scout out the potential professional candidates.
WPS will be holding two combines for potential players – the first this weekend in San Diego and the second from December 18-21 in Ft. Lauderdale, FL. At each combine, 72 different players will vie to catch the eyes of the WPS coaches and managers on hand with the hopes of landing a roster spot on one of the seven founding teams for the inaugural WPS season. Many of those faces will be familiar to Sky Blue fans with 16 of those players having previously put on a Sky Blue uniform.
CLICK HERE to read more about the WPS Combines ...
After playing for Sky Blue's W-League team the past two summers, Fanta Cooper is looking to impress at the WPS East Coast Combine. (Robyn McNeil)
Sky Blue Soccer announced today that the Somerset, NJ-based company has come to an agreement to transfer the rights to its W-League women's soccer franchise to Quickstrike FC in New York. The agreement allows Sky Blue Soccer to focus on running its professional franchise - Sky Blue FC - in the inaugural season of Women's Professional Soccer (WPS) in 2009.
The W-League team will be relocated to New York and will be renamed the Hudson Valley Quickstrike Lady Blues. As part of the deal, Sky Blue Soccer and Quickstrike FC will work together with the Lady Blues serving as a feeder/identification program for the Sky Blue FC professional team.
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE ABOUT HUDSON VALLEY QUICKSTRIKE FC LADY BLUES ...
Congratulations go out to a number of former players from the Jersey Sky Blue W-League team!
The NSCAA announced its Division I All-America teams recently and an impressive seven former Jersey Sky Blue players made the list. The following players were honored:
FIRST TEAM
Becky Edwards (JSB 2007) - Florida State
Nikki Krzysik (JSB 2007) - Virginia
Casey Nogueira (JSB 2007) - North Carolina
SECOND TEAM
Erin Guthrie (JSB 2007, 2008) - Rutgers
Carolyn Blank (JSB 2008) - West Virginia
Tobin Heath (JSB 2007) - North Carolina
THIRD TEAM
Yolanda Odenyo (JSB 2008) - Oklahoma State
In addition, Nogueira and Heath were members of the University of North Carolina team that captured the NCAA College Cup championship on Sunday while Edwards was part of the United States team that captured the FIFA Under-20 Women's World Cup in Chile later on Sunday.
For the complete NSCAA All-America teams, CLICK HERE.
For the story on North Carolina's championship, CLICK HERE.
For the story on the US U-20 team's world championship, CLICK HERE.
Sky Blue Soccer Manager of Marketing and Public Relations Gloria Averbuch is in a unique situation this weekend. Both of her daughters are playing in the NCAA College Cup this weekend but for different teams. If UNC beats UCLA and Stanford beats Notre Dame, then Yael and Shira would meet up in the championship match.
The News & Observer has a story about it all in today's edition:
Averbuchs a win from dream
Sisters could play each other in final
Yael (pronounced Ya'el), a Hebrew name taken from a Biblical heroine, signifies strength. The Hebrew name Shira means "poem" or "song."
So, if the North Carolina and Stanford women's soccer teams win their College Cup semifinal games today in Cary, strength and poetry will meet Sunday in the form of two sisters, Yael and Shira Averbuch (pronounced A'ver'bush). Both are midfielders, Yael a senior for UNC, Shira a freshman for Stanford.
Sky Blue Soccer announced today that Kelly Lindsey has been hired to fill the role of assistant coach for the organization’s pro team Sky Blue FC – the NJ/NY entry into Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS). Lindsey joins head coach and general manager Ian Sawyers on the Sky Blue FC staff after serving as the head women’s soccer coach at Saint Mary’s College in California.
Lindsey guided the Saint Mary’s program the past three seasons after spending two years as the top assistant to Chris Petrucelli at the University of Texas. She also served as an assistant coach at the University of Colorado for one season in 2003. A United States Soccer Federation “A” License holder, Lindsey also worked with the US Under-21 National Team in 2004.
The former University of Notre Dame standout will be reunited with Sawyers after playing for him for three seasons with the San Jose CyberRays of the Women's United Soccer Association (WUSA) from 2001 to 2003.
CLICK HERE for the whole story about Kelly Lindsey and Sky Blue FC ...
Sky Blue Soccer earned another honor from United Soccer Leagues this past weekend when Jersey Sky Blue was presented with the W-League Communications Award at the USL Annual General Meetings in Tampa, FL.
Sky Blue Soccer has operated Jersey Sky Blue in the W-League the past two seasons with success both on and off the field. Jersey Sky Blue reached the playoffs in 2007 before earning the W-League Rookie Franchise of the Year Award. The Somerset, NJ based organization will seek to maintain this success in 2009 when it introduces Sky Blue FC - the NJ/NY franchise for Women's Professional Soccer.
"We're proud of this award because we've always put an emphasis on a strong communications plan," said Sky Blue Soccer President and CEO Thomas Hofstetter. "We had a communications plan before we even had a team and we plan to continue this effort forward into the WPS season in 2009."
Sky Blue FC will kick off the inaugural season of WPS in April of 2009 and will play its home games at Yurcak Field on the campus of Rutgers University in Piscataway, NJ. Season tickets and holiday gift packages are on sale now at the Sky Blue Soccer website www.SkyBlueSoccer.com.
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