Knowing what to say is only part of being a leader.
Being able to read a situation and to gauge how and when something needs to be said is just as crucial an ingredient to building team chemistry.
If leaders are judged on their ability to speak after the game, Sabrina Moore is at the top of her class.
It’s not that the Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science senior midfielder directs traffic and offers suggestions at the top of her lungs for 80 minutes every match. While Moore admits she is a chatterbox on the field, she prefers to pick her spots and to impart constructive criticism designed to generate positive results.
She can also drive home a point with her feet pretty clearly.
Moore proved she is adept at non-verbal communication by scoring three goals in the MSMS girls soccer team’s first two matches of the season against West Point and Louisville. For her accomplishment, Moore is The Dispatch’s Prep Player of the Week.
“I am a strong believer that the ball has to get through the whole field in order for someone to score,” Moore said. “I feel (the goals) were the hard work of our team in the practice season and earlier in the year in the pickup games. Some of those goals were a little bit of luck, but I will take it.”
Moore, who is from Starkville, played youth soccer with the Starkville Soccer Association. She honed her craft at the youth level with Richard Stubbs as her coach. She then played two years for coach Anna Albritton at Starkville High before transferring the MSMS, which is in Columbus on the campus of Mississippi University for Women, as a junior.
Now in her second season with the Blues, Moore has stepped into a bigger leadership role. She said she watched and learned last season as other seniors assumed the biggest leadership roles on the team. This season, she didn’t allow any time to waste, organizing conditioning sessions as early as August to help prepare the team for the start of the season.
“I didn’t think I would be as comfortable with the position (of team leader) as I am,” Moore said. “I think it says a lot about the girls on the team and the general environment. They are all easy to work with and they all really want to learn. They are all big on giving all of the their effort all of the time, which is something I really try to stress with them. I feel it is more important than skill, for the most part.”
Don’t get the sense, though, that Moore patrols the field waiting for things to correct in a manner that suggests she knows everything. Generally, she said she isn’t that comfortable leading a group of people. She attempts to maintain a serious approach and to lead by example, which worked well on her youth teams and at Starkville High and has carried over to this season.
“I try really hard to keep a positive attitude regardless of the situation,” Moore said. “I try to be really responsive to when criticism is helping and when people aren’t having a good day and they don;t want to hear it, so I hold off.
“Sometimes waiting until after the play is finished (is the best time to say something) and taking them one on one instead of doing in front of everyone.”
MSMS girls soccer coach Chuck Yarborough said Moore recruited potential players and helped get the more experienced players together to run on the Riverwalk in downtown Columbus and to work out at the Stark Recreation Center on the MUW campus. He said he didn’t even realize Moore had brought everyone together until his daughter, India, a former player at Columbus High, told him after the team’s third or fourth session.
Yarborough, who also has worked as a coach at Columbus High, said he wasn’t surprised Moore took the initiative to build team chemistry because Moore is an emissary at the school, or a student ambassador, who helps juniors adjust to MSMS, which features only juniors and seniors from around the state. He also said Moore is an academic leader on campus who is involved in several clubs and organizations.
“She is an established academic and social leader at the school,” Yarborough said. “It is kind of a natural fit because she plays the same kind of role on the athletic field.”
Yarborough said Moore played integral roles in MSMS’ 7-0 victory against West Point and a 4-0 victory against Louisville. He said Moore is equally comfortable distributing the ball to wings and forwards and setting them up in prime scoring positions. He said she also can dissect a defense, which she did against Louisville by scoring a goal from outside the 18-yard box with a shot into the upper left corner of the goal.
Yarborough credits Stubbs and Albritton for helping to develop the leadership qualities in Moore.
“Sabrina very much on the field coaches her teammates like Richard Stubbs coached recreational and competitive teams,” Yarborough said. “He is always positive and emphasizing things you’re doing right. She tends to be a very positive and supportive player. She doesn’t say everything is OK, but she says this is what you’re doing right and let’s do more of that. That kind of positive, supportive leadership is pretty unique on competitive teams.”
Moore said the work everyone put in in the preseason helped build relationships between the players so they trust each other and are aware some players aren’t as experienced as others. She is excited about the prospects for the team this season. She also wants to keep doing what she is doing and that she stays attentive to what the team wants her to be and to play that role and not forget to bring everyone together.
“She is the quintessential leader,” Yarborough said of her two-year captain. “Her leadership as a senior has helped bring together a group of 25 teammates who have mostly not played together prior to this season. This season, we have 12 players who started on the varsity squad at their home school. However, they have not played together, so there is a great leadership challenge. Sabrina has been incredibly effective bringing these talented young ladies together to succeed as a team.”
MSMS will play host to Philadelphia today, Southeast Lauderdale on Thursday, and Columbus on Friday. All of the team’s home matches are at the Downtown Columbus Soccer Complex.
Follow Dispatch sports editor Adam Minichino @ctsportseditor.
Adam Minichino is the former Sports Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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