Former Timberlane standout Leah Morrier has been a record-setting key for the Rivier this fall. (Photo courtesy of Rivier Athletics)

NASHUA – Rivier University women’s soccer coach Dan Milton remembers being down in Florida late last winter, recruiting at a showcase.

His cell phone rang, and he pulled over into the emergency lane on the interstate.

He’s glad he did.

Milton got the best news he could get. He landed the New Hampshire 2023-2024 Gatorade Player of the Year award after helping Timberlane Regional to the Division I girls soccer state title.

“She was trying to figure it all out, and at the end of our conversation, probably our 15th or 20th call, she finally said, ‘Riv’s the place for me, I want to come.’

“I would have stopped anywhere in the world to have that conversation her.”

Of course, that was referring to current Raider scoring sensation Leah Morrier, who goes into Wednesday’s GNAC semifinals vs. Lasell at Riv’s Joanne Merrill Field as the Raiders leading scorer, setting records in goals (16 heading into finale) and assists (nine at same point) and who knows, she could be a serious candidate for conference Player of the Year. It’s no wonder the Raiders reached the double digit mark in GNAC wins, etc.

It was quite the journey to Rivier for Morrier, who lived the good days of Timberlane’s window of success. She had committed to UMass-Lowell her junior year. Then senior year, in the winter, she suffered an injury and then de-committed.

“I was planning on not playing soccer again,” she said, noting that the injuries had piled up in high school – she suffered a broken leg in 2022 in a quarterfinal win over then-defending champion Bishop Guertin – to the point that she felt she had had enough. She and she ended up going to the University of New Hampshire, commuting from her family’s home in Plaistow. But while there Morrier went to a couple of Wildcat games and realized she missed playing.

“A lot,” she added.

It turned out that one of her friends from Timberlane was on the Rivier women’s basketball team, and she went to her games. “I just liked being around college sports again, even more,” she said.

She started training on her own. Morrier played club soccer in past years on boys teams, so that in Milton’s mind is how she plays as tenacious as she does.

The oddessy began when Milton got an email out of the blue during the winter from Morrier, who looked at Rivier also because she was a nursing major.

“It was the most basic of emails,” he said. “It was like ‘Are you looking for anybody in your recruiting class next year?'”

The name was somewhat familiar, but Milton wanted to know more so he checked with his assistant coach Kendrick Whittle, who runs girls program FC Stars, New Hampshire. When he told Whittle of the email, “You could hear the dead silence. His first answer was, ‘If you get a Leah Morrier, you compete for the GNAC (title) right away.’ And then he followed it up with, ‘She’s not just going to be one of your best players, she’s going to be one of your best players off the field too.’

“Little did I know what sort of impact Leah was going to make until she got here this fall. She came here for preseason, lit the world up on fire, started scoring goals and doing her thing right away. … You expect it from Leah. She deserves this. She’s been working eight months on her own, kicking balls against the wall, training by herself, doing her thing. She’s been working for this moment right now. It hasn’t just fallen into her lap. It may have fallen into our lap, but she’s been working behind the scenes when no one’s been watching.”

Morrier’s skills didn’t just all of a sudden disappear with the time off, obviously. But to make sure, once she committed to Riv, Milton asked Morrier to get herself back into a team environment, playing or practicing with the FC Stars, even though they were a little younger, getting touches, getting in shape, etc.

While she branched out to training with some summer teams, but still her first day this past August on the field with her new teammates, over a year removed from the sport, felt “a little weird, actually. I wasn’t expecting it to be so weird to be on a team again. But it was a really good experience, I was very happy to be playing again.”

In fact, nerves set in. She had a fitness test Aug. 16, the first day, etc. To say the least, she stood out right away in a brief scrimmage. “To have countless players come up and say, ‘Hey, now we know why we’ve heard of this Leah kid. August 16 was the first glimpse of it, but then you look at other games we’ve had this season.” Milton points to a win over Saint Joseph’s. “That’s a game where, without Leah on the field, who knows? I think when she steps on the field, players say ‘OK, I’m not just going to rise to the occasion, Leah’s going to bring me up to the occasion as well.’ We’ve been seeing it for awhile now. Everybody else is seeing it too.”

Morrier, as the Raiders begin tourney play, isn’t a secret anymore. What separates Morrier from others on the field?

“Her ability on the ball to make decisions no one else can see,” Milton said. “I think the runs she makes are very intelligent runs. When she gets the ball, it’s not ‘Oh what do I do now with it?’ It has a beginning, middle, end, a clear idea of what the play is going to look like.

“So just like how she manifested eight months on what training she was going to do, she manifests each part of the game and gets an idea of what needs to be done. So when she gets on the ball, she’s got her decision made up already. It’s just a matter of can you stop her. Can somebody get close enough to her when they can stop her.”

Morrier has a quick burst when she has the scent of a great scoring opportunity.

“You put her in front of the net, nine times out of 10, she’s creating what you want,” he said. “And when she doesn’t do it, you’re almost surprised at it. She doesn’t let a single bit of negativity bring her down in any sort of way. She’s not like a robot in a way, but she can quickly forget about the negative piece and get right back to her game. She’s got that goldfish mentality everybody talks about.”

And, Milton said, Morrier knows one chance isn’t going to be all she gets. More like four or five a game. “Her success rate,” he said, “is through the roof right now.”

Morrier couldn’t have possibly expected to have the success she had after such a long layoff. And at the beginning of the season, she was, as she said, “having more troubl adjusting to playing soccer than I expected. But I definitely was not expecting any (success) like this.”

Being in the team atmosphere was different, and the fact the Raiders were so close-knit was a surprise. In high school, with so many multi-sport athletes, “everyone has their friend groups from different teams.”

But at Rivier, they’re all for one and one for all.

Morrier is finding that teams are now marking her tighter as the word is out. What’s a player to do? Set the program assist mark. And keep up her physical strength to handle the more physical level of the college game.

“She’s always in the weight room,” Milton said. “If she gets a spare moment during the day because she’s a commuter – she doesn’t have a dorm room – what does she do when she has two free hours, she’s in the gym. Her longevity and her ability to keep herself healthy is all because she’s doing the extra bit when no one else is watching.”

But, Milton added, when Morrier is on the field, “She doesn’t put herself in scenarios that don’t rule in her favor. She’s going for balls that are more 60-40, 70-30. When she gets on those, that’s where she’s really going to be something special. … I’ve never seena 50-50 challenge from Leah. It’s always 60-40 in her favor.”

But Morrier’s game is not selfish. She had the assist record locked in five to six games into the season. “That overall player, that’s what we get out of her,” Milton said. “We just don’t get a goal scorer, we get a complete player.”

It obviously felt good for her to win the Gatorade Player of the Year award, the first Owl to have done it. “It hadn’t been done before, so leaving a lot of different marks there was really cool. We hadn’t had a Gatorade Player, we had never been in a state championship (game) and won. So I was happy with it.”

While she made history at Timberlane, she’s made history at Rivier. She’s left a mark on two programs, and she’s only been at the second one for a couple of months. “It feels really good,” she said. Morrier says she’s “very excited” for the challenge of the GNAC tournament, and loves an aspect of the Raiders.

“The biggest thing I’ve noticed with this team is the attitude of it,” she said. “I think everyone wants everyone to succeed. I really haven’t noticed any jealousy. It’s just a real positive atmosphere.”

As Milton said, “All of a sudden she has 30 best friends now.”

Milton says Morrier often lands in his office asking what she can do to improve. “A kid that is breaking records asking ‘What can I do more of?’,” he said. “That’s probably one of the hardest conversations I’ve every had.”

At first, Milton was dumbfounded. But then he began to explore ways Morrier could adjust her game even more. “That right now is her biggest piece, begin able to adjust to different styles of what teams throw at her.”

Academically, Morrier is a sophomore, but athletically in terms of NCAA eligibility, she’s a freshman. But you might not want to count on that fourth year; nursing majors usually move on to their chosen career in hospitals.

“We’re probably guaranteed two more years,” Milton said, “A third year if we’re lucky. She’s going to be good at whatever she does. Whether it’s on the field, in a classroom, or in the hospital, man, you can trust her with your life.”

Milton feels the Raiders have hit the jackpot. Rivier had problems last year scoring goals, but Morrier has helped solve that problem, so going into the postseason Miton feels Rivier’s depth will be a key because they have their health.

And they have Morrier.

“I’m glad she’s chosen us, I’m glad she’s chosen Riv,” Milton said. “I think from an academic side and a culture side, we can’t be more grateful to have a kid like Leah.

“She’s a good soccer player, but she’s an even better human being. That’s what makes it fun to root for Leah.”