To help the women's soccer team prepare for the upcoming season, coach Denise Dallamora, as she does every year, prepared a packet for the players to take home this summer detailing offseason training methods that would keep the players in game condition. "The ideas really are just the components of a fit soccer player," Dallamora said. "The fitness components . were put together with a weight training program, a sprint workout [and] some agility workout. It's really just all the components of what it takes to compete in a soccer match."

But while the packet may be the same as in previous years, the expectations have been raised. After capturing the program's first-ever Eastern College Athletic Conference Tournament championship, the Judges hope to take the next step this season and qualify for the NCAA Tournament.

"We only lost a few starters from last year, and our freshmen really stepped up last year, and I really think that we're probably going to have a good incoming class," defender Meredith Milstein '09 said. "So I think we're ready [to make the NCAA Tournament], and I think we know after last year what it takes to get to NCAAs and how much harder we have to push ourselves."

Last year, the Judges finished 13-6-2, winning their last five games, including three in the ECAC tournament en route to the title.

"[I hope] everybody has good chemistry on the team and that we just start where we ended last year, because we ended on a really good note," forward Melissa Gorenkoff '10 said.

To continue to improve, the Judges will have to deal with the loss of seven seniors, including starting forward Tzlil Castel '08, last season's ECAC Tournament Most Valuable Player, midfielder Sarah Jasak '08, who led the team with 24 points last season, and midfielder Lizzie Bremner '08, who started all but one game for the Judges last year.

Gorenkoff, who tied Jasak with eight goals in 2007, forward Tiffany Pacheco '11, defenders Abby Shields '10 and Taryn Martiniello '11 and goalie Hillary Rosenzweig '10, all of whom played starting roles last year, are returning this season. Former starting defender Ruth Orbach '11 is also returning this year as a midfielder.

"I think that we have a lot of underclassmen, . and a lot of them already played big roles in the last season," said Milstein, the only remaining senior on this year's team after midfielders Lindsay Deslauriers '09 and Jenna Lipawksy '09 left the team last spring. "So I think others are going to step up because they want to compete for the starting positions that were lost, and I think the other ones who already were on the field are really just going to step their game up."

Fifteen first-years will join the returnees this season. The list includes midfielder Izabella Miranda '12, forward/midfielder Francesca Shin '12 and midfielder/defender Alanna Torre '12.

The squad also adds three goalkeepers, including Jaclyn Weinstein '12, Elysse Phillips '12 and Natasha Pieciak '09, who played on the team for three years before joining the Army for two years.

Forward Alina Schnake-Mahl '11 will also make her fall debut, having joined the team in the spring as a midyear student.

The Judges start off their season at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Aug. 30 at 1 p.m.