Keep calm, score more goals

Sally Steinberg spent her first three seasons at Dalhousie University learning how to score goals. In her fourth, she has taken her game to another level.

Nine games into the season, the Tigers striker leads all of U Sports with a career-high 11 goals with three games remaining in the season. Six of her markers came from two separate hat tricks on Sept. 11 and Oct. 3. 

Steinberg has led the team to a 6-1-2 record to begin the season, which is tied for first in the U Sports Atlantic conference. The Tigers rank eighth in the country, as of U Sports Oct. 5 rankings. 

The start earned Steinberg Atlantic University Sport Player of the Week on Sept. 15. .

“The biggest thing I learned after four years was to just take a breath and have fun and enjoy it,” says Steinberg. “You’re with your best friends playing a sport that you love.”

It hasn’t always come that easily. 

Steinberg says she used to get “too excited” around the net and miss her shots. This season her head coach, Cindy Tye, gave her two objectives: take a breath in front of the goal, and look forward to playing forward.

“I’m more comfortable if I have a defender on my back to play backwards,” says Steinberg. “She’s challenged me to get my head up, turn and try to run at the defence.”

Tye says Steinberg’s combination of physicality and speed has made her a valuable player on the team. 

“Sally’s got great physicality. She’s a strong kid. She’s also fast,” says Tye. 

Fourth-year defender Sarah Giles, says Steinberg passes other players with her speed, strength and power.

“She’ll take a touch around you and then get an amazing shot off; she’s so strong,” says Giles. “[Steinberg] is just an amazing athlete.” 

Fourth-year midfielder Maeve McCloskey says her favourite goal by Steinberg was in a game against Mount Allison University, when Steinberg muscled a defender off the ball and buried it.

“She really understands…where to run and find those pockets of space,” says McCloskey. “Of course, finishing is where she’s dangerous.” 

Team chemistry 

Last Season, the Tigers finished first in the conference with a 10-1-1 record, but were eliminated in the conference finals.

Steinberg says this is the closest Tigers team she has been a part of. In her first year, she didn’t know the fourth-years well. Now she knows every first-year personally.

“It’s hard to describe how close we all are because we’re all just best friends,” says Steinberg. “We all just want the best for each other, and we’re all pushing each other to perform to our best and to succeed.”

Both McCloskey and Giles see the same work ethic in Steinberg away from the field.

A biochemistry student with a minor in business, Steinberg is a two-time Academic All-Canadian.

“By the time I’m up, she’s already out the door studying, and by the time I’m asleep, she’s still at the library studying,” says Giles.

Tye says balance makes Steinberg a role model for younger players on the team. 

“She has to work for everything she gets … that makes her relatable to them,” says Tye. 

Steinberg and the Tigers have their sights set on the AUS championship at the end of October before the U Sports championship in Vancouver on Nov. 12-15.