Is Rice women’s soccer’s ‘Transfer Forward University’?

Graduate forward Leah Chancey shoots the ball during the game on Sept. 26. Cayden Chen / Thresher

By Diego Palos Rodriguez 10/22/24 11:42pm

On Oct. 3, graduate forward Leah Chancey broke the Temple University defensive line and found herself face-to-face with the goalkeeper. On her first touch, she shot the ball past the keeper, marking her eighth straight game with a goal, breaking the program record and maintaining the longest active goal-scoring streak in the NCAA.

Despite the streak ending in the next match against the University of North Texas, Chancey provided two assists that propelled the Owls to their 11th win of the season, tied for the second most in head coach Brian Lee’s time at Rice. While Chancey’s numbers might seem unprecedented, Rice soccer fans know that this is just another highly successful graduate transfer forward who has had a significant impact on the Owls’ season.

In 2022, Grace Collins announced that she would be transferring from Texas Christian University to Rice, an unexpected move considering TCU’s success in the Big 12 Conference and her individual success on the team. Earning Big 12 Offensive Player of the Year in just her sophomore season with the Horned Frogs, Collins played a huge role in an Owl squad that had just recently made it to the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament. She finished the season with the most goals and assists on the team with nine and eight, respectively. She also set the Conference USA record for the most assists in a single game, with five against the University of the Incarnate Word. Collins led the Owls to the C-USA tournament as the No. 1 seed, but they were knocked out in the first round, ending Collins’s time with the program.

While the Owls lost a key piece in Collins, Lee recruited another graduate forward, Ellen Halseth from Hofstra University in 2023. She was among Hofstra’s top scorers in multiple seasons there, and the same followed in her year at Rice. While the Owls finished 3-13-2, Halseth led the Owls in both goals and assists, with five each, as well as points, shots and shots on goal. The team did not qualify for their first American Athletic Conference tournament, but Halseth proved to be another crucial asset in what was otherwise a low-output season.

Now, Chancey is not only following in the footsteps of these two transfer forwards, but she’s going beyond what Rice fans have seen in recent years. After playing three seasons at Southern Methodist University, Chancey had only amassed two goals in her collegiate career. In her 15 games with Rice, she has scored nine and assisted four, leading the AAC in goals and points while helping the Owls to first place in the conference as of Oct. 22, clinching the AAC Tournament three games out from the end of the regular season.

Is Rice soccer the place to be for transferring forwards around the country? Or is it the graduate programs in accounting, energy economics and data science that attract these players? Whatever Lee is telling them in recruitment talks, it must be working.