An abbreviated version of the following feature, written by Director of Athletic Communication Jon Holtz, appears in the fall 2023 issue of The Rock Alumni Magazine that was delivered in November. To view the full magazine online, click HERE.
 
FROM THE ROCK TO THE WORLD CUP
During her senior year of high school in Maryland in 2017, eventual Slippery Rock University alumna Sofia Harrison was presented with an opportunity she never could have imagined. In the running for the county soccer player of the year award, Harrison's Filipina aunt posted the voting link to Facebook to try to get more support from her friends. It seemed like a simple gesture at the time, but that one simple act would lay the foundation for her to realize the dream of nearly every soccer player that has ever put on a pair of boots.
 
Harrison fell in love with Slippery Rock during the recruiting phase, in no small part thanks to the commitment of head coach Jessica Giegucz and former assistant coach Mark Sappington. The coaching duo wanted her at The Rock and were relentless in their pursuit. They attended nearly every tournament and showcase Harrison participated in, even though she lived in Maryland.
 
"Jessie and Mark showed me how much they cared about me when I was looking for a school," says Harrison. "They made me feel valued and appreciated as a player and that was important in my decision. I was also looking for a good balance between academics and athletics and SRU obviously has one of the best exercise science programs in the nation, so it became an easy decision for me to choose Slippery Rock."
 
Harrison came to SRU in the fall of 2017 and earned a starting role on defense as a true freshman. She would end up starting all 18 games that first year on campus and would cap her first season of collegiate soccer with an opportunity most Division II players never get.
 
It turns out that Facebook post her aunt made during her senior year of high school had reached all the way to the Philippines and managed to be seen by a liaison to the Philippine National Women's Football Team. The Filipinas were long seen as an afterthought on the world stage when it came to soccer, ranking well outside the top 75 in the World Rankings and never appearing in any of the biggest tournaments in the world. But with rules that allow foreign-born players to represent their heritage countries, the Philippine Football Federation and a new management staff began to look to America in attempt to find Filipina-American women that could possibly help set the program on a new path.
 
"I got a direct message on Instagram from a guy claiming to be a liaison to the Philippine National Team, asking if I would be interested in attending a tryout," says Harrison. "Honestly, I thought it was a scam at first, but I am glad I responded and asked for more information."
 
Harrison left Slippery Rock in November of 2017 after her freshman season and flew to California to try out for the Philippine National Team. She made such a strong impression that she was invited to team camps in 2018, but never made the initial roster. That changed not long after when she earned a call-up for the Asia Football Federation (AFF) tournament in 2018. She made her first national team appearance against Vietnam in that tournament, playing in just one game.
 
"It was incredible to have the chance to play for a national team while I was still at Slippery Rock," says Harrison. "But it was short-lived. That was the only appearance I made in a game and I did not receive another call-up the rest of my time at SRU."
 
Harrison returned to The Rock and kept leading the defensive unit. She started all 16 games of her sophomore season and then started all 22 games in 2019, leading SRU to the PSAC title and a top seed in the NCAA Division II Playoffs. She set career-highs for goals (7), assists (2), points (16) and game-winning goals (3), all from her defensive position.



She was poised for an even bigger year the following fall as she entered her senior season, only to see that opportunity ripped away when COVID-19 canceled all fall sports in 2020.
 
Without a senior season to compete, the chances of Harrison ever playing competitive soccer again were dwindling. Still, she took advantage of the facilities and coaching at SRU and kept training that year, in case a chance ever matriculated again.
 
"I think having access to the facilities and still being able to train and lean on our coaches was really important for me that year," says Harrison. "It was heartbreaking to not have my senior season, but I think I was able to turn that year into a positive for me because I was able to keep training and stay focused."
 
That dedication paid off in 2021 when another representative from the Philippine National Team reached out to Harrison and asked if she was still interested in playing. Because of the pandemic, the team was working out individually in different places around the world and submitting videos and results of those workouts to the staff through the Facebook group. Harrison began doing the workouts and submitting her results.
 
In August of 2021, she was invited back to California for another tryout for a tournament in Uzbekistan. She tried out again. She made the team again. And this time she made it stick.
 
Harrison earned a starting role in that tournament in 2021, starting two games as a center back, an unusual role for one of the shortest players on the roster. It was a testament to how important the staff viewed her moving forward. The Filipinas' performance in Uzbekistan qualified them for the Asian Federation Championships in 2022, where they knew if they made it through group play and won a knockout game, they would qualify for the first World Cup appearance in the Philippines history.
 
"We made it through the group stage in India and knew we had to beat Chinese Taipei in the knockout round to make the World Cup," says Harrison. "I just tried to stay focused on the task at hand and not let the possibilities impact how we played that day. We ended up tying 1-1 after regulation and extra time and had to go to penalties, where our keeper made a couple saves and we ended up winning. We stormed the field screaming and crying. It hit us right there on the field the magnitude of what we had done. We stayed on the field so long after that game that security had to ask us to leave."
 
Despite starting every game in that tournament and helping the team to qualify for the World Cup, Harrison refused to assume she would make the final roster.
 
"Nothing is ever guaranteed," she says. "I try to go into everything with the same mindset. I never let myself believe I was guaranteed to be on the team."
 
Harrison briefly spent time in Germany playing for Werder Bremen of the Bundesliga, the top league in Germany, but ultimately left the club to focus on the national team. She took part in multiple month-long camps and the team played friendlies and other tournaments in every FIFA window possible leading up to the World Cup. She started in all of them, still not letting herself believe she was a lock to make the team even though she had racked up 34 appearances.
 
"We flew to Australia in June and had a month-long camp right before the World Cup," she says. "We had around 30 players in that camp and only 23 can make the final roster. The coaches waited until the last day before we flew to New Zealand to announce the roster. They called us all in one at a time. It was probably the most nervous I have ever been. I sat down and our coach asked me why I looked so nervous. I told him because this means so much to me. He said 'it should mean a lot, because you're going to the World Cup.' I think it took a few seconds to set in and then I just started to cry. I had worked so hard for so many years and to be named to the final roster was such a huge accomplishment. All the hard work was worth it."
 
Harrison and the Filipinas flew to New Zealand, where they would play all three of their group stage games in Group A. Before getting to the games that counted, the team had another surreal experience when they were told they would be playing a closed-door, secret exhibition game against the No. 1 ranked team in the world, the two-time defending World Cup champion U.S. Women's National Team.
 
"I guess I can talk about it now," she laughs. "We were strictly forbidden from saying anything to anyone about playing in that game. We played two 35-minute halves and they beat us 3-0, but that showed us that we could play with anyone. We only allowed three goals against the best team in the world and it gave us a ton of confidence. I had to mark Sophia Smith in the first half and Trinity Rodman in the second half. Those are two of the biggest names in the world right now and it was an incredible experience to get to play against them, but it wasn't a moment that was too big for us. We treated it like any other game against any other team and that mentality was the exact way we wanted to approach the World Cup games."
 
A few days later, Harrison was named as the starting left back for the Filipinas' opening game against Switzerland.
 
"It was a surreal moment for me standing in the tunnel before that game," she says. "We don't usually play games in front of crowds like that and with kids walking out of the tunnel with us. It was such a professional and surreal environment. A lot of the team started to cry during the Philippine National Anthem because it was a realization of how far we had come and what we were about to achieve."



The Filipinas would end up losing that opening game 2-0 to the much higher ranked Switzerland team, but it wasn't the dominant win many pundits had predicted. Harrison played all 90 minutes and was involved on both ends of the field, drawing a yellow card on defense, firing a dangerous cross into the area and nearly scoring a goal with a shot late in the second half.
 
"We were upset that we lost that game, but overall we thought we played really well," she says. "We immediately focused on the good things we could take forward and began to prepare for the next game."
 
The next game would be the biggest stage any of the Filipinas had ever played on. They had to play against the host country, New Zealand, on its home turf. Nearly 33,000 people showed up for that game and packed a sold-out Wellington Regional Stadium.
 
"That's definitely the craziest atmosphere I've ever been in and it was surreal to walk into the stadium and see that many people," says Harrison. "We tried to take it with the same mentality we had all along and just not let it distract us. There were obviously a lot of people rooting for New Zealand, but we had way more Philippine support in that stadium than people might have realized. It gave us a huge boost seeing our supporters. It was an emotional day for me because my family was there as well."
 
Less than 30 minutes into that game, the Filipinas sent the sold-out arena into a frenzy when Sarina Bolden found the back of the net with a towering header to give the country its first World Cup goal in history and a 1-0 lead over the heavily favored Football Ferns.
 
"It was amazing seeing that ball in the back of the net," said Harrison, who started that game and played all 90 minutes again. "I just took off running after Sarina. It was the culmination of everything we all worked so hard for. We knew we had a whole game to play still, but we also realized that was a moment in history for this team and country that would never be taken away."
 
As the clock began to edge closer to 90 minutes, the pressure amplified on defense for Harrison and her teammates. New Zealand pushed hard late in the game and looked to have found the equalizer, but a video review deemed the play was offsides and kept the score at 1-0.
 
"We never assumed we would win," says Harrison. "We just tried to stay focused until the final whistle. We had no idea how much longer stoppage time would go. We just kept playing hard and waiting for that final whistle."
 
Then it came. The final whistle. It was over. The Filipinas had earned a 1-0 shutout over the hosts and had picked up the first World Cup win in the country's history. The television broadcast switched to live feeds of public areas in the Philippines where huge crowds were erupting in celebration. Then it switched back to the arena, where Harrison and her teammates were celebrating the biggest sporting achievement of their lives.
 
"It's still a blur," she says. "We were all crying and screaming and running around celebrating with our teammates and our families and all of the fans. If you had seen how hard I was crying after that game, you would have probably thought we lost. It was such a surreal moment in my life. I don't think of myself as an important or special person, but to have fans in the stands yelling out my name and asking for photos and autographs was incredible. It put into perspective how much it meant to Filipino people to see themselves represented on the biggest stage in the world."



The Filipinas would bow out of the World Cup with a loss to 12th ranked Norway in the final group stage game a few days later, putting a cap on what was deemed to be an incredibly successful debut. Just days after leaving New Zealand, the team returned to the Philippines and received an overwhelming welcome.
 
"It was crazy when we got back to the Philippines," says Harrison. "We usually go through the airport like normal people, getting our own luggage and going through customs. But this time we had people doing that stuff for us and we were escorted through a crowd of people that came out to welcome us back. They threw a parade for us and we had a lot of media and press. It was incredible to see the amount of support we had for football in general but also for a women's sport. I don't think it really had set in what we accomplished and I am not sure we will ever truly understand the magnitude of what we did. To be able to grow the number of supporters for soccer in the Philippines and to be able to inspire the young boys and girls to want to play the sport is maybe even more important than winning a game at the World Cup."
 
Now back in the United States, Harrison is still training and is looking for her next professional club with hopes of continuing to play for the Philippine National Team.
 
"I would love to go to another World Cup," she says. "We are going to have a coaching change and everything is uncertain at the moment, but hopefully I can keep playing for the National Team for as long as possible."
 
Harrison, who was the only Division II player of the 137 current or former NCAA players to make a World Cup roster this year, is well aware of the role that Slippery Rock played in helping her reach the biggest stage in the game.
 
"Slippery Rock was so important to my success and helping me get where I am today," she says. "My degree in exercise science has helped me be a better athlete by helping me understand my body and what it needs to perform well and recover efficiently, and the soccer program and coaches have helped me tremendously. Being able to train with them last spring and the fact that the team welcomed me and let me be around and help develop my skills was really important for me. I'm incredibly proud to say I played at Slippery Rock and that experience helped lead me to the World Cup."
 
 
 
 
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