8A - Thursday, October 25, 2012
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.cam
Back on the pitch, Jaffe plays a big role
By STEVEN BRAID
Daily Sports Writer
Right hand bouncing against
the wall, left foot twisting back
and forth, Emily Jaffe leaned up
against the outer brick wall of the
U-M Soccer Complex, enjoying a
sun-soaked afternoon.
Just two days after scoring
on her second header in as many
games - the first one being a
game-winningtallyagainstMich-
igan State in overtime on Oct. 10-
the 5-foot-6 senior midfielder was
all smiles.
Sheepish from all of the atten-
tion she had received, the Ann
Arbor native blushed incessantly
and goofily smiled as she reflect-
ed on a collegiate career that had
come full circle.
Not too long ago, she had
walked away from the game.
Playing high school soccer
right in Michigan's backyard,
Jaffe asserted herself for Pioneer
High School. She was a three-
time All-Conference and a three-
time All-District selection, as well
as a .Division-I All-State selection
after her junior season.
"She was poetry in motion,"
said Chris Morgan, who coached
Jaffe at Pioneer until her senior
year. "She was always trying to
execute and she was a very cre-
ative player. She dedicated herself
to the team. She was just a joy to
watch because she worked so
hard."
Jaffe worked tirelessly year-
round. She would show up to
practice early and tried to stay
late, asking Morgan for more
drills. She battled through inju-
ries, spending a great deal of time
with the team trainer but never
enough time to take herself off the
field.
"There was a point, actually,
where we had to tell her to stop
working so hard," Morgan said.
"She was training so much that
she was doing more harm than
good."
The work paid dividends,
thoughf x'ig various chjipgs
started calling. Morgan said he
jokingly tried to persuade her to
choose Michigan or Michigan
State so that he could watch her
play. Though becoming a Wol-
verine would have been the easy
choice, Jaffe wanted to go some-
place new, a school far enough
away from home where she could
grow independently.
With a connection to Iowa's
women's soccer coach Ron Rain-
ey, who she had met through
the U.S. Olympic Development
Program, and a love for the cam-
pus in Iowa City, she decided on
the Hawkeyes. Before first-year
Michigan coach Greg Ryan ever
had a chance to see her play, Jaffe
had committed to Iowa.
"By the time (Ryan) came in
and started recruiting players, I
felt like I wanted to be commit-
ted," she said. "It was the high
school rush."
But the midfielder's time with
the Hawkeyes was short-lived.
Midway, through the 2009 sea-
son, Jaffe no longer wanted to
play soccer. Playing a significant
role off the bench for Iowa during
her freshman season, she quit the
team after just eight game appear-
ances.
"I think I got really burnt out
on soccer," Jaffe said. "To be at
this level, for a lot of girls, that's
all they do in high school and
middle school. I felt like I needed
a little more variety in my life and
balance, so I gave up soccer and
found some other things that I
was interested in."
Added Morgan: "It didn't
surprise me that she burnt out
because she played 24/7. We
would always tryto getherto take
time off between club and high
school and training on her own
because her body was just getting
beat up. It didn't surprise me that
she had to walk away from the
game for a while."
Though disappointed that he
had lost a talented player halfway
through the collegiate season,
Rainey said he understood the
decision.
"We talked about it," he said.
"You want your athletes to be
"enjoying themselves. You've got
as soon as the 2011 club season
began and she began playing soc-
cer again, Jaffe could no longer
ignore the itch.
"I definitely missed the com-
petitive level ofplay," Jaffe said. "I
felt like I couldn't find something
in my life to compete at."
Just two weeks into the club
season, she contacted the varsity
coachingstaff.
Jaffe finally landed a midsea-
son tryout on Tuesday, Sept. 20,
nine games into the Wolverines'
season.
During the midfielder's first
practice with the Michigan wom-
en's soccer team, Ryan split his
team into two squads so that the
Wolverines could play a posses-
sion game. He put his starters in
the game that he was watching
and he put Jaffe with the rest of
the team in the game that assis-
tant coach Angela Napoli was in
charge of watching.
Ryan walked over to Napoli to
get her thoughts on the new addi-
tion.
"What did you think of Emily?"
Ryan asked.
"She'll be starting on Friday,"
Napoli replied.
The next day, Ryan placed Jaffe
with the starters so that he could
gauge her ability for himself.After
the game, he went back to Napoli.
"You're right, she's starting on
Friday."
Three days after joining the
Wolverines, the transfer found
herself in the starting lineup at
midfield against Minnesota.
But since that game, her time
with the Wolverines has been a
real rollercoaster ride. After start-
ing the next six contests, Jaffe
missed the final three games of
the season following an appen-
dectomy.
Entering the 2012 season, Jaffe
found herself in the starting line-
up once again, but after 12 games,
she was relegated to the bench.
"We talked about it," Ryan said.
"She felt that she was ina little bit
of a slump and we talked about it
being easier for her coming off the
Her minutes slowly dipped
and three games later, she found
herself on the bench for all of
regulation as the Wolverines bat-
tled Michigan State to overtime.
Looking to inject life into the
team, Ryan substituted her in at
the beginning of the extra period.
Ten minutes later, the midfielder
found herself in the middle of a
celebration pile after heading in
the game-winning goal, the first
score of her career.
Five days later in Michigan's
2-0 victory against Purdue, with
the monkey off her back, Jaffe
came in off the bench and headed
in another corner kick.
She attributed her time away
from the game to her recentresur-
gence.
"These past few weeks I was in
a slump," Jaffe said. "But instead
of just digging myself deeper, and
deeper in a hole, I could step back
and re-evaluate and see that I
should just be playing to enjoyit."
Now, with just a few weeks left
in her career, the senior saidshe is
just trying to appreciate her time
on the field.
"I'm not trying to think about
the end because I don't really
want to face being done," Jaffe
said. "Especially with taking
some time off, I wish I could have
it all back."
Jaffetried to take an extra year
of eligibility, but the NCAA ruled
thatherseasonwiththe clubteam
in 2010 counted toward her four
years. They also ruled that her
seven games withtheteam in 2011
were too many for her to ask for a
medical redshirt.
Though Jaffe will end her col-
legiate career earlier than she
would like, Morgan is just happy
that his former player was able
to rekindle her passion for soc-
cer and find a second chance with
Michigan.
"For everything that she has
done for the game, helping other
players -she brought joy to my
life - it's nice to see her get that
payback," Morgan said. "I know it
hasn't always been easy for her, so
Senior Emily Jaffe (5) celebrates her game-winning goal against Michigan State.
school - the first year of school
is a stressful time. There were no
hard feelings. I try to respect the
athlete's decision."
With more free time, Jaffe said
that she started exploring other
interests that were a lot less "self-
involved." She became passionate
about environmental studies. She
started to volunteer in the com-
munity, and even began tutoring.
For the first time in as long as
she could remember, she wasn't
playing soccer - and she was
enjoying it.
"It allowed me to step back and
get a little more perspective, and
see that soccer isn't the center of
the universe," Jaffe said.
With her determination to play
soccer at a competitive level gone,
there was nothing keeping her at
Iowa. She decided to transfer and
head home.
school that I figured if I'm not
playing soccer out of state, then I
should just attend Michigan," the
senior said. "Being homesick also
very much influenced my deci-
sion."
Upon transferring, Jaffe made
the choice not to contact the wom-
en's soccer coaching staff, and
instead, settled on playing for the
less-competitive clubsoccer team.
But within weeks, she had
urges to contact Ryan to try to
play for the varsity team.
"I thought about it a lot," Jaffe
said. "I thought about contacting
Greg because I was getting my
passion back, but I stepped back
and decided notto."
The club season ended and,
with that, so did her thoughts of
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