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Injury can't stop Lecanto's 'warrior'

By KELLIE DIXON
Published December 31, 2006

LECANTO - Sweeper Erin Carpenter is the orchestra leader when it comes to organizing Lecanto's defense.

That's what assistant coach Willie Bulgin calls the versatile junior. It's a role she doesn't take lightly, and one she doesn't plan to forfeit even with a hard cast on her wrist.

Last week, she had surgery to repair her right thumb, which she broke in a game this season. A pin was inserted so the bone could reattach itself.

Bulgin considers Carpenter tough, a warrior. After all, this is the player who figured her broken wrist was simply a sprain and played with it taped for weeks. Only when the bruising and swelling didn't go away did she go in for an X-ray.

But the left-handed Carpenter, who started playing sweeper for the first time this season, considers herself just a piece to the Panthers' puzzle. There's a district championship to win, and her surgically repaired wrist, as far as she is concerned, is an afterthought. She'll just add padding her hard cast to the list of pregame necessities. It will be no different than slipping on her game jersey, sliding on her shin guards or lacing up her cleats.

She's tough by nature. And Carpenter thinks her older brother Cole probably had something to do with that.

Cole is three years older than Erin, and the siblings roughhoused quite a bit growing up. Even now, every now and again, the two will go at it. Her brother never went easy on her. She never expected that.

"I was more like a little brother than a little sister to him," Carpenter said. "He wouldn't really baby me."

That didn't change just because Carpenter hurt her hand, either.

"If I were to complain about my thumb, he'd be like, 'You can still play soccer. I don't see why you're concerned. You're left-handed, anyway, so it's not a big deal. It's not like you're having heart surgery,' " Carpenter said.

Still, Erin said, Cole did the brotherly thing and made sure his little sister could play with the cast. He checked with his buddies who either play or officiate, and they concurred. Carpenter would be fine as long as she padded her hard cast. The decision to let her play hasn't been officially cleared, but Carpenter is optimistic.

The cast might affect her ability to take throw-ins, but it shouldn't affect her ability to talk to and lead her teammates on defense.

Her determination to get back on the field has junior goalkeeper Andraya Avery breathing a sigh of relief.

"Erin was born to play sweeper," Avery said. "She's really good. She's always there. Even when we're doing the practices, and they're doing the offensive drills. She seems to always get her foot in and disrupt the play somehow."

It's instinct for Carpenter, and she has found her role as the leader of Lecanto's rotational defense, though the position was new to her this season.

Carpenter had played defense before. She was a right back as a freshman. But this year her team needed her to combine her defensive talent and her leadership ability, from running center-midfield as a sophomore, and take on the sweeper spot.

Lecanto had graduated its entire defense, including its goalkeeper from last year. Carpenter, Bulgin said, was going to be the center of the Panthers' new defense.

No problem.

In fact, Carpenter liked it.

"I like the position, because you can see everything that's going on, and you can control your defense," Carpenter said. "It's easier to see what's going on and how to assume, estimate where people are going to go. I can tell my defenders what they need to do."

She conducts the orchestra, so to speak, cast and all.

"She's just a warrior," said Bulgin, who works primarily with Lecanto's defense. "She runs all day. The best part about Erin playing the sweeper part is that she'll play off people. She'll have the patience when need be, and she can go like an animal when it's time to go."

And the pink or green or whatever color cast Carpenter decides on, won't slow her down.

Kellie Dixon can be reached at kdixon@sptimes.com or (352) 544-9480.

[Last modified December 30, 2006, 20:38:09]