Jenny Walz turned in an impressive 2004 summer with the W-League's Fort Wayne, earning all-league honors despite taking on a new position of outside back.

What I Did Last Summer: Jenny Walz

Aug. 13, 2004

Several Notre Dame women’s soccer players had unique summer experiences and four of them – Jenny Walz, Lizzie Reed, Nikki Westfall and Miranda Ford – will be sharing their summer memories with und.com readers over the next few days. First up is junior Jenny Walz, a top reserve midfielder with the Irish in 2002 before missing the ’03 season with an ACL knee injury. Walz returned to action last spring and then had a stellar summer season with the W-League’s Fort Wayne Fever – earning all-league honors despite tackling the new position of outside back. Walz had a solid game in Thursday’s 1-0 win over the Motorola club team in Jaguarina, Brazil, including a play in which she raced back to clear the ball off the doorstep of the vacated goal.

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Jenny Walz was one of several Notre Dame players who helped the Fort Wayne Fever finish near the top of the W-League standings.

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What I Did Last Summer – Entry #1 (Jenny Walz; Fort Wayne Fever) Soooo, if you really wanna know what I’ve been up to this summer… here you go! Honestly, it began a little too early. The inaugural season for the Fort Wayne Fever Women’s League team was set to start only a week after school ended. So, basically, I moved out of my dorm and into my first apartment in magical Fort Wayne. Seeing as how I had never been to “The Fort” before, I am surprised I even found it. Luckily for me, my teammates Christie Shaner and Amy Warner already had settled in and it only took me a handful of phone calls before I had arrived. Fort Wayne turned out to be a home away from home because my Fever teammates consisted of several other Notre Dame players, including Mary Boland and two of Christie’s classmates (Kim Lorenzen and Jill Krivacek). There was plenty of Notre Dame family to keep me from getting lonely! Speaking of lonely, I’m looking for a boyfriend. Wait, this is not the place for that … sorry. What I meant to say was that our apartment was NOT lonely. Divide three rooms and two bathrooms by five girls and you have Shaner sleeping in the tub! Just kidding, she had her own room AND bathroom (what is that?!) The rest of us slept on blow-up beds or futon mattresses on the floor, with no other furniture in the entire place. We survived by feasting on macaroni and cheese, vegetable soup and peanut butter and jelly. On special nights, we dined at Chick-fil-A … Jill’s FAVORITE!

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Jill Krivacek played alongside Jenny Walz as a midfielder with the 2004 Fort Wayne Fever.

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You’re probably dying to know how we spent our waking hours of the day. We made our best efforts to sleep the day away, but practice, eating, and reading (yes reading) were just enough to make us tired again.Living in Fort Wayne was the opposite of our busy final days at school. We were thankful to finally catch up on sleep, but we found that SO much free time became a little boring. Forced to resort to spending time playing games like dictionary and spelling bee really makes you remember how nice it is to go home to cable TV in the summer. (Just kidding, we don’t play nerdy games like that…wink wink.) Honestly though, spelling bee is a dangerous game – remember the kid who fainted?? OK, enough about the boring stuff. Lets talk about soccccccer. We practiced and played at a complex in Fort Wayne called The Plex. The game fields were in perfect condition and the 3,000-person stadium was barely big enough to cover our massive fan base of about 10. The season started off well, with a win in Cincinnati followed by a series of wins through the month of June. In July we were on the road, but still bringing home the “dubbyahs.” The Fever soon became rivals of Jen Buczkowski’s team, the Chicago Cobras, because we were constantly battling for first place in the region. Playing against our Notre Dame teammates gave us extra motivation to stay in first place. There’s nothing better than talking smack with Kate Tulisiak and Nikki Westfall (representing Cleveland) and Melissa Tancredi (playing for Detroit).

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Jen Buczkowski and her Chicago Cobras teammates ultimately beat the Fever in the W-League playoffs.

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In addition to the many new experiences magical Fort Wayne provided me, I even got to take on a new position. So two games into the season and against my will, the coaches converted me from a center midfielder to right back. It was a daunting challenge, since I had never played defense a day in my life, but with central defenders like Christie Shaner and Kim Lorenzen backing me up, I learned quickly. And now … I think I am an official defender?!! Strange … But, all and all, playing with the Fever over the summer was interesting to say the least and gave me a chance to play with my Notre Dame teammates in preparation for the season. We are in Brazil right now … soooo, I am off to get my WAX!!! LOOOVE jwalz #14