By Carson Steffen, contributor

If you do not know who wears the number 1 on their jersey on the SDSU Women’s soccer team, you will definitely know who she is by the end of this season. Kailey Carlen is the star goalkeeper for the Women’s soccer team here at SDSU. 

Her freshman year at SDSU Carlen started all 20 games and played all the way through each one. She won the Mountain West Freshman of the Week and Academic All-Mountain West rewards that season. At the end of the season there were 70 saved goals, 9 wins, 4 losses, and 7 ties. 

Before SDSU she has played for clubs like Albion SC here in San Diego for the past three years and Rebels SC for two seasons before Albion SC. As for the beginning of the 2026-2027 season, Carlen is starting off strong with 5 wins, 2 losses, and 1 tie. She has 22 saves and has played 706 minutes so far this season. 

On September 17th, SDSU played Pepperdine and once again Carlen started the game and played until the 90th minute every time. With her having 22 saves in just 8 games, you knew she would be tough to score on.

Throughout the game, Carlen could be heard directing her teammates where to go if there was an opening for the other team to score and encouraging her teammates with a high five after a good attack, move, or play. You can see her being laser focused on the ball and back up into the net when the ball would get closer to the goal.

Carlen has a handful of impressive saves during the game. She snatched the ball out from the air and dove to stop them from going in, and that helped show her athleticism and how it will be difficult to get anything in her goal. 

The team would help protect Carlen by keeping Pepperdine on the opposite side of their goalie as much as possible. The defender, Mia Hambro Svendsen, helped by having amazing attacks on the ball while making sure it stayed away from her goalie. The midfielders, KK Chowana-Bandhu and Alexyz Nakamoto, were quick to get the ball back in SDSU’s possession before it got to their keeper.

The game ended with the score of 2-0 in favor of the Aztecs. Carlen had a total of one shootout goal and zero goals allowed during the entire game and played all throughout the 90 minutes. 

The next game is September 20th here at SDSU’s sportdeck against Northern Colorado. Carlen will surely be protecting the net again, so if you have not seen her play yet, Sunday afternoon is your next chance.