New coaches making a difference for East Carolina women’s soccer
GREENVILLE, N.C. — A great word not commonly used, is “WINNINGEST”. This well-earned word has been used to describe the ECU women’s soccer coaches, who are leading the Lady Pirates in the same direction.
Gary Higgins, a native of Paisley, Scotland, was appointed East Carolina’s fifth head coach in March 2022. Higgins was the head coach to the Lenoir-Rhyne Bears in Hickory, NC, leading them to make history in women’s soccer before joining the Pirate program.
Higgins led the Bears to the 2021 Division II Semifinals, the ladies first trip to the Final Four in the school’s history. He was also a SAC (South Atlantic Conference) Coach-of-the-Year selection twice while head coach in Hickory from 2015 to 2022.
Coach Higgins left the Lenoir-Rhyne program with a career record of 83-31-13, making him the all-time “WINNINGEST” coach for women’s soccer.
The new coach has already created history here at East Carolina, during the televised game against Duke in August, calling out for a record-breaking crowd.
“With a record attendance of up to 14oo in the crowd, it was pretty cool and a great way to get things started in the right direction,” Higgins says. The Pirates held their own during the game against the No. 2 rank Blue Devils, with a loss of only 1-0 at Johnson Stadium.
Another new face on the women’s field this season is Assistant Coach Evan Gaffney, originally from Dublin, Ireland. Hopefully the ECU ladies are good with accents!
Gaffney was a junior goalkeeper coach for the Irish Pro Keepers Academy, before attending Truett McConnell University (GA) where he was a four-year starter. He then served as a part-time keeper coach for the women’s soccer program at Truett, before graduating in December 2020 with a Business Administration Degree with a Sports Management Concentration.
“Primarily Evan works with goalkeepers and has done a really great job of taking the game to the next level. I’m really excited to have his expertise!”
Assistant Coach Emily Buccilla “knows East Carolina like the back of her hand” and has guided the Pirate’s to many victories as an assistant coach for four seasons.
Before joining the Pirate Nation, Buccilla was an assistant women’s soccer coach at Stetson University (FL) for four years. She is a St. Bonaventure University (NY) Alumni, where she led the “WINNINGEST” senior class in SBU history to four consecutive Atlantic Championships, as team captain.
The women’s soccer season is well on its way, with the pre-season practices beginning the first week of August. Higgins explains, “They pretty much practiced like professional soccer players during pre-season, because they hadn’t started classes yet.”
The ladies practiced weeks before the Fall 2022 semester began in two sessions each day, a session in the early morning and late evening due to the summer temperatures. The Pirate’s extensive practices have certainly paid off, as they are having a great 2022 season!
Head Coach Higgins looks forward to the upcoming conference games with teams that are “nationally ranked pretty consistently”, such as Memphis, SFU and UCF. He explains, “There’s no easy game by any means, so every game you have to really really fight to get results. We’re excited for that challenge!”
With their impressive winning streak, let’s support them to become the “WINNINGEST” East Carolina University’s women’s soccer team! Go Pirates!
UPCOMING EAST CAROLINA WOMEN’S SOCCER
Oct. 9 (Sun) @2pm
@ MEMPHIS
Oct. 16 (Sun) @12pm
vs SOUTH FLORIDA
Oct. 20 (Thurs) @7pm
@UCF
Oct. 23 (Sun) @12:30pm
@TEMPLE
Oct. 27 (Thurs) @7pm
vs CINCINNATI
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