Mann thrives in her first season as member of soccer team

Junior forward Angie Mann is playing in her first season in a Southeast Missouri State women's soccer uniform but has been playing soccer since she was 3 years old.

"I played on my older brother's team, so I was small when I started," Mann said.

Growing up in Wisconsin, Mann attended Grafton High School where she also played soccer and had the honor to play in the state title game, which she says has helped her today playing collegiate soccer.

"Having the opportunity to go to state really helped me with the college experience," Mann said. "The fan bases and everything are so much bigger in college than in high school, so going to state the games were similar to what they are in college."

Mann then went on to attend college at Central Michigan where she played for two years and saw action in 23 games.

Over time, according to Mann, she began to struggle at Central Michigan because they wanted to change where she played.

"When I was at Central Michigan they tried to switch me from offense to defense and I was struggling with it and it never really clicked with me, so eventually I had to kind of step back and decide whether I was going to stay over there or leave and I decided to leave." Mann said.

Needing to find a better fit, some of Mann's old teammates from her club team reached out to her and told her that she should give Southeast a look and that she would fit well into the program.

"When they head that I was struggling over at my old school they reached out to me and said you should look here," Mann said.

Since becoming a Redhawk, Mann has scored five goals and averages 1.67 shots per game. Her best game in a Redhawks uniform came on the road at Lynn University where she recorded a hat trick.

Mann is humble and credits most of the success to her teammates.

"I credit most of that to my team, we just had a lot of composure in the box and I was there to finish it," Mann said.

Southeast coach Heather Nelson believes having Mann on the field improves the team's odds when trying to maintain possession.

"She's a very aggressive player," Nelson said. "If there is any chance of a 50/50 ball she's probably going to turn that into a 60/40 for us."

Nelson believes that Mann is starting to grow into a leader on the team. Nelson thinks she is still new to the team but possesses the character traits needed to be a leader.

Mann said she thinks the younger girls look up to her and hopes that they can model what they do and how they play after her.

"I think that the younger girls might look up to me," Mann said. "I hope they kind of see me as someone who can overcome things and they look at that and they can model what they do after that."

Mann plays with an aggressive two-footed style, which means she can be a threat with either of her feet at any time.

"We probably have more players that are threats with both feet then me have had in a long time, Angie would definitely be one of those," Nelson said.

While being two-footed as well as an aggressive player, Mann is a forward that likes to grind more plays out, which you don't see in the majority of forwards.

"Her physical presence compared to the majority of our forwards would be on the very high side," Nelson said.

Being a physical type forward is not the most common thing, according to Nelson.

"Forward players tend to be more finesse players and Angie brings that ability to grind as well as the finesse on the field," Nelson said.

Mann said playing for Nelson has taken her play to a completely different level.

"She [Nelson] talks a lot about family and how your team is your family and you need to do things for your family that you wouldn't do just for yourself," Mann said. "I've really been able to come out of playing for me and more playing for my family and I think that's taken me to another level that I have never been to before."