Just one week after graduating from Royal High School in Southern California earlier this year, freshman Zoe Hasenauer moved to Eugene to start summer practices for Oregon soccer. In the three months since the season began, Hasenauer has started every game and leads the Ducks with four assists.
However, the Ducks, which are just 1-7 in conference play, are stuck in a seven-game losing streak and haven’t placed in the top-five of the Pac-12 since 2006.
Hasenauer hopes to change that during her time at Oregon. It’s why she chose Oregon, even over national champion and current No. 1 Stanford, and No. 2 USC, which also recruited her.
“I just knew I really wanted to come in and make an impact freshman year,” she said. “I wanted to change the program around.”
Hasenauer, who has two older sisters who played soccer collegiately and who helped her dad coach her American Youth Soccer Organization (AYSO) games, essentially grew up on the sidelines of soccer fields.
“She always had the most intense drive of all of them,” Hasenauer’s mother, Kim, said.
Her teammate, sophomore Chardonnay Curran, said of the freshman’s first scrimmage, “Once I saw her make a first play, I already knew she was going to have a huge impact on this team.”
However, the pace of Pac-12 play is much quicker than what Hasenauer expected, even with the national team training she’d done with the Olympic Development Program (ODP). And while head coach Kat Mertz thinks Hasenauer has it in her to bring new life to the program, she’ll need to become more goal-minded and willing to take risks in practice to build confidence.

Hasenauer has historically thought of herself as someone who creates scoring opportunities for other people, working the ball up the field and running give-and-go’s.
“Just as long as we score I don’t really care who does it,” she said, laughing.
But, to see the changes she wants to see at Oregon, she’ll need to take more offensive chances said Mertz, who, in last week’s game against UCLA, moved Hasenauer from playing as an attacking midfielder and center forward to right winger in the absence of leading scorer Marissa Everett.
“She’s a very good finisher,” Mertz said. “She’s good around the box. We’re trying to find a way to create goals, so we wanted her closer to the goal.”
Oregon still has three games this regular season, all at home at Papé Field. The Ducks will play Arizona State on Thursday night, followed by a Sunday matchup against Arizona at noon. Hasenauer and her team will finish the regular season against Oregon State on Nov. 2 at 6 p.m at home.
Despite the adjustments, Hasenauer hasn’t given up on her dream to reshape the fabric of Oregon soccer and help the team qualify for the NCAA Tournament for the first time in the program’s 25-year history.
“It’s only her first year — three more years to go,” Curran said. “She’s someone to watch.”
Follow Sierra Webster on Twitter @WebsterSierraE