Stanley’s Dreams Have Become Reality : Soccer: USC women’s coach thinks possibilities are unlimited for program in burgeoning sport.

One of the first things Karen Stanley did when she moved into her office at USC’s Heritage Hall was to hang the poster on the wall behind her desk.

Not just any poster. This one had been carefully guarded on its journey across the Pacific. This one, lilac-colored and covered in Chinese characters, is both a reminder and an inspiration.

It reminds Stanley of the highlight of her career--not as a soccer player or soccer coach, but as a soccer spectator.

She was there, in Guangzhou, China, on the night of Nov. 30, 1991, when U.S. soccer history was made.

Sitting in the stands at Tianhe Stadium, surrounded by a small group of Americans and 60,000 Chinese, she watched in disbelief and delight as the U.S. team defeated Norway, 2-1, for the first FIFA Women’s World Championship.

Stanley remembers the winning goal almost in slow motion, frame by frame, as U.S. striker Michelle Akers-Stahl stole the ball, drew the Norwegian goalkeeper out of position, eluded her, then stabbed the shot into the empty net.

“It was amazing,” Stanley said. “I can’t believe I was there for it.”

Someone else who was there that night was Joy Fawcett, one of the key defenders on the world championship team.

Now, the two are together again, not as spectator and player, but as cross-town rivals.

Fawcett, still a vital part of the U.S. team that will defend its title in Sweden next summer, is the women’s soccer coach at UCLA.

Stanley, who will travel to Sweden to support the U.S. squad, is USC’s women’s soccer coach.

The schedule calls for the Bruins and Trojans to meet twice this season, the first time at USC next Tuesday.

“I know it’s going to be difficult,” Stanley said. “(Fawcett) is a great coach and a great recruiter. They’re going to be tough. Every year it’s going to be a great rivalry, just like in the other sports.”

Stanley, 32, has come a long way in soccer and her rise parallels the rapid growth of the women’s game over the last quarter-century.

In 1970 her father, who is from the former Yugoslavia, began volunteering his time as an American Youth Soccer Assn. (AYSO) referee in Claremont and encouraged his 8-year-old daughter to discover the sport.

“He said, ‘Why don’t you try it?’ ” Stanley recalls. “I got into it and found out the real love of life, no doubt about it.”

Stanley’s passion for soccer developed further at Claremont High, but in those days competitive girls’ soccer was still something of a novelty.

“When I went there, they didn’t have a girls’ team, they had a boys’ team,” Stanley said. “So starting in my junior year, I played on the boys’ team. It was not controversial, but it was an issue. It was very new, and people couldn’t believe it.

“I had a great time, a lot of great experiences. I learned a lot. The year after I graduated, they got a girls’ team, so I missed out a little bit.”

The same thing was true at the next step in her career. Again, women’s soccer on the college level was just beginning to find its feet and Chico State, Stanley’s school, was no exception.

“Everyone had a club team,” Stanley said. “We played Cal, Stanford, Santa Clara, San Diego--all the teams that are now top Division I teams. But at that point, 1980 through ‘84, no one was divisional, no one was varsity, we were all club status.

“My last year up there, everyone started going varsity. That was in ’84. The first (U.S. women’s) national team was (founded in) 1985.”

Today, girls and women play high school and college soccer all over the country.

According to figures compiled by the National Federation of State High School Assns., 5,463 high schools field girls’ soccer teams, involving 166,173 players.

Similarly, figures from the NCAA reveal that 387 affiliated universities have teams, including 103 Division I schools. Total participation, the NCAA said, is 8,226 players. The numbers have tripled in the last 10 years and doubled in the last five.

Add in the more than 150 NAIA and NJCAA colleges that field women’s soccer teams and the level of participant interest in the sport is clear.

But when Stanley graduated from Chico State with a bachelor’s degree in physical education and a master’s in wellness, there were not many soccer jobs to be had.

“I didn’t know what I was going to do or where I was going to go,” she said.

A meeting with Seattle Pacific soccer Coach Cliff McGrath changed that. McGrath talked Stanley into heading north to begin a women’s club program.

“He got me started in coaching,” she said. “He employed me full-time at his (soccer) camp and I directed international tours for him and did his club program at Seattle Pacific. It was great. I had a thousand part-time soccer jobs.

“It was fun but it was frustrating because we were a club and we were playing against varsity teams. There were nine NAIA schools and then us. There was no money. I spent all my own money on recruiting. It was going nowhere, then Notre Dame showed up out of the blue.”

Stanley had met the two Notre Dame soccer coaches, Mike Bertucelli and Chris Petrucelli, and got along well with both. Offered an assistant coaching position, she jumped at the chance.

That lasted two years, or until USC expressed interest in starting a women’s program. In April, 1993, Stanley came on board as head coach of the fledgling Trojan soccer team, with instructions to build it from the ground up.

“I knew from the second that I got back on the plane to fly back to South Bend after my (USC) interview that if they offered me the job, I’d take it,” Stanley said. “There was no doubt in my mind.

“I think it was a combination of things. It’s very diverse here, in terms of ethnicity and culture, and (school officials) really try to work within the city with a lot of different people. I really like that attitude.

“The other thing is that in the athletic department here, it seems to me that everybody helps everybody else. Soccer is a relatively small sport at a big football school, but I never feel that way. I can tell just by the way people react. Everyone is there to support you.”

The first year was anything but easy, however.

“I got here in April and I was trying to recruit for the following fall,” Stanley said. “But all the players who were signing letters of intent had already signed. And I had one scholarship. And I didn’t know the players out here because I was educated on the players back East and in the Midwest.

“It was definitely just a scramble. I didn’t have an assistant coach. It was difficult.

“It was a wonderful challenge, but I felt like I was swimming in the ocean and getting hit by waves. I’d come up again and get hit in the face by another one. It was never ending. It was amazing.”

Small wonder, then, that USC finished that first season 2-15-2.

“They were a great group, but they just weren’t Division I caliber,” Stanley said. “The schedule was really demanding, especially for a new program. It was almost like a club trying to compete against varsity. We just weren’t ready.

“The other thing is, we weren’t (at USC), we were out at Cal Tech in Pasadena. We didn’t have a soccer field. So every day we had to drive vans out there. In preseason, twice a day. It was probably an hour out of the kids’ study time and going out there in smoggy Pasadena was a toll on the kids and the program. In addition to losing, it was hard.

“Now we’re on campus, thanks to (USC Athletic Director) Mike Garrett and (football Coach) John Robinson.

“I’m like in awe. I know at a major football school like this they certainly don’t have to do that. (Robinson) and his entire staff are just so supportive. I feel like they’re big brothers.

“The other huge thing that happened is that Mike Garrett gave us four more scholarships.”

USC is playing as an independent this year for the last time. Next season, women’s soccer will be a Pac-10 sport.

“I plan to do most of my recruiting in Southern California because I think there’s great talent here,” she said. “At all the big California tournaments I go to, I see all the college coaches from back East out here. So it’s exciting to be at a school like this and to track that kind of talent.

“I’m where I want to be for the rest of my life. I believe that we have the chance to be very successful here.”

And next year, the poster from Sweden ’95 will go up alogside the one from China ’91.