To casual followers of the U.S. women’s soccer team, Erica Dambach’s name might not be familiar. But to many years’ worth of players and coaches, it means a lot.
Nineteen years into her tenure as Penn State’s head women’s soccer coach, Dambach hasn’t just built one of the nation’s top college programs. She has built a pipeline from State College to the sport’s biggest stages.
If the first name you think of is Alyssa Naeher, you’re right. But the legendary goalkeeper is far from alone. Christine Nairn arrived in Naeher’s senior year, then overlapped with Raquel Rodríguez, who won a 2015 national championship and later a NWSL title.
Rodríguez overlapped with Marissa Sheva, who went from Bucks County to Ireland’s first-ever World Cup team in 2023. Sheva then overlapped with Kerry Abello, Kate Wiesner, and Sam Coffey, who have played for Emma Hayes’ U.S. national team.
Wiesner later welcomed Olivia Smith, who spent just one year on campus before rocketing to the pros. Her move from Liverpool to Arsenal last year was the first in women’s soccer to earn a transfer fee of over 1 million British pounds (around $1.4 million).
Along the way, Dambach has had her own turns with U.S. Soccer coaching staffs. She was an under-19 team assistant in 2004, the under-17 head coach from 2004 to 2007, and a senior team assistant from 2008 to 2012 and in 2020.
It’s been quite a run for the 50-year-old, with room for plenty more to come.
“There’s been opportunities to to look in different directions or to think about is the grass greener,” Dambach told The Inquirer. “And I think every time I’ve looked in a different direction, all it does is reaffirm that this is who I am, and this is what I enjoy.”
But go back before all that, and you’re standing in the Philadelphia suburbs.
‘These women live out their dreams’
Dambach was born in Bordentown, N.J., and moved across the Delaware River to Huntingdon Valley at a young age. She played high school soccer on the boys’ team at Lower Moreland, then was recruited to play college soccer at another historic program, William & Mary.
Her coaching career began a year after she graduated in 1996. She started at Bucknell, then went to Dartmouth, Lehigh, Florida State, and Harvard before Penn State called in 2007.
Now Dambach’s mantel includes 11 Big Ten regular season titles, five conference tournament crowns, that 2015 national championship, runner-up in 2012, and five more Elite Eights.
And there have been so many players who’ve made it to the pros.
“It’s a big reason why I’m in the college game for sure, to see these women live out their dreams,” Dambach said. “Obviously, when they sit in our office when they’re 14 years old, they talk about lifting a World Cup trophy. And now to see these players get an opportunity to wear the crest and to represent the country and watch their dreams come true, it’s certainly proud moments around here.”
Dambach faces the same headwinds as other college coaches these days. No one bats an eye anymore when a talented teen turns pro without going to college.
“What I’ve learned is that when a player and a family has their mindset on it when their daughter’s 16, you need to be careful because they’re going to find a way to get there [to the pros] very soon,” she said. “The generational talent of Claire Hutton? Yeah, good move.”
But while Hutton already has 15 caps at age 20, there’s still plenty of room for college products. Dambach believes that can remain the case.
“I would argue that our ability to help the 17-, 18-, 19-year-olds right now, that time is too valuable in their life and too precious in their life,” she said. “This is an environment where I do think that they can get to all the same points with having a little bit more guidance in their first time away from home. And having people that are educated and care about that side of the human and the player.”
Another is the fight every college coach has: to get NIL money and attract top players with it. Dambach is comfortable with where she is on that front.
“There are 10 programs historically, five to 10 programs, that are competing for a national championship,” Dambach said. “You’ve got those teams that have seniors that bubble up and have a particularly good year. But when those programs go head to head for a player, you’re splitting hairs, and the dollars do matter.”
It also helps that Penn State just opened a $21 million expansion of its soccer facilities a few days ago. And Dambach has the privilege of a veteran staff, including three assistants who’ve been there for 15 years or more. One of them, Ann Cook, was her roommate at William & Mary.
“I think [players] walk in here and they know that they’re going to be coached by four head coaches, four coaches that have been sought after by so many different programs,” Dambach said, “and they look at it, and everywhere they turn it’s going to be a professional environment for them.”
Tributes from the stars
Dambach knows Hayes well and keeps in touch with Coffey and other former players. Ahead of the U.S.’s return to north Jersey for Saturday’s SheBelieves Cup against Colombia (3:30 p.m., TBS, Telemundo 62), that duo paid tributes to their friend.
“I could, like, write a book on her just to give an answer,” said Coffey, who transferred from Boston College after her sophomore season (and could indeed write that book as a journalism major). She was an attacking midfielder at the time, and Dambach helped convert her to the ball hawk she is now.
“I came from B.C. as a player that was so one-dimensional, and it might sound shocking, but I really had no interest in defending whatsoever,” Coffey said. “I just think that she developed me so much as a player and a person.”
The latter still resonates.
“She is so focused on us being this complete person,” Coffey said. “Especially when you’re at a college age, it can so easily be so much about just what you do on the field, but for her it’s all about who you are in all aspects of your life.”
Hayes recalled that when she came to the U.S. from England to begin her coaching journey in the early 2000s, Dambach was “the first coach I looked at and that I was in close contact with. I thought she’s the best, and I think she’s quietly had an influence on my own career.”
Now Hayes gets to take Dambach’s players on their next journeys. Coffey is a star, and Wiesner is a World Cup contender. (She was to be on this SheBelieves Cup squad until suffering a calf injury last month.)
“It’s the way players speak about her, it’s the way other colleagues speak about her,” Hayes said of Dambach. “It’s a real testament to not just the quality she has, but the longevity to keep doing that, and to keep producing players whose characters you can clearly see have been well-shaped.”
There even was praise from a U.S. player who played against Penn State back in the day and has worked with Dambach over the years since. Emily Sonnett was part of a 5-1 Virginia rout of the Nittany Lions in 2013, before earning well over 100 national team caps.
“When she was in [the national team], she led a lot of our small-group meetings in terms of defending and was] very detailed,” Sonnett said. “That short amount of time, the impact that she had on me, and the intentionality … I really enjoyed working with her, and when I see her, I remind her how much I enjoyed it.”
Told of this, especially the players’ words, Dambach was moved.
“Honestly, you know, that means a lot,” she said. “That’s never going to get old for me. … Those are two world-class players and world-class humans, and the fact we can play a small part in it is everything.”
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