By John Frierson
Staff Writer

Summer Denigan is rolling. The Georgia soccer redshirt junior scored twice in Sunday’s 3-0 win over Michigan at the Turner Soccer Complex and now has four goals in her last three games.

“I’m having a blast right now,” Denigan said. “It’s very, very fun.”

Scoring is fun, and winning is fun.

The Bulldogs (3-1-0) opened their season with a 1-0 loss to UCLA, now ranked No. 4 in the United Soccer Coaches Poll, and have followed that with a 6-0 win over Albany, a 2-0 win late Thursday night over No. 12 North Carolina, the defending national champions, and followed that notable victory with a decisive win over the Wolverines.

After the win over UNC in a game that had more than two hours of delays due to storms in Athens and then was completed in a driving rainstorm, Georgia coach Keidane McAlpine stressed to his team the importance of following a great win with another victory.

“I think this game was more difficult than that one in some ways,” McAlpine said. “It’s hard to get up to that level, have that level of euphoria, and then turn around and have to get back to that level again, so I’m really happy with the way that we were able to come out and put in a solid performance.”

“We came out here knowing this is going to be the biggest game of our season so far, after coming off a high of North Carolina,” Denigan said. “We knew we had to walk in and finish the game Sunday on our tired legs, and we got the job done.”

A 5-foot-4 midfielder from Union, Ky., Denigan began her collegiate career at Florida State, where she played in three games before a season-ending injury forced her to redshirt. After transferring to Georgia, she tied for the team lead with six goals and was the SEC Co-Freshman of the Year, as well as second-team All-SEC, in 2023. Last fall, she tied for the team lead with four assists and was second among the Bulldogs with five goals.

So far in 2025, she has four goals and an assist in four games.

“Just good energy,” Denigan said of her hot start to the season. “I’m making sure I’m always in position to score and able to do whatever my team needs.”

McAlpine said Denigan had an “incredible” spring and has built on it over the summer and into the season.

“She’s taken another step. She’s playing happier, she’s playing freer, and she’s stepping into the leadership role,” McAlpine said. “It’s not a loud leadership role, it’s quiet and subtle, but it’s still leadership.

“I think her understanding of where and when and how, what her strengths are, what her spots are, that’s all started to show and is really lifting the team.”

Nearly 20 minutes into the game, Denigan found the back of the net from about 25 yards out with a right-footed strike into the top left corner of the goal, off an assist from midfielder Juliauna Hayward. Now teammates after Hayward transferred from Colorado, Hayward said the two first met about a decade ago at a national team camp.

“I told her the other day, I’m so glad that we’ve been able to cross paths again,” said Hayward, who scored the Bulldogs’ third goal Sunday, her second of the season. “Everyone knows her as a stud; she’s amazing, so when she’s out here and she’s hot, get the ball to Summer Dennigan.

“I think the good thing about her, too, is she knows she can score, but she’s also a very unselfish player. She knows how to pass and she knows how to move, so I love playing with her.”

Denigan’s long strike Sunday was the only goal of the first half, and she made it 2-0 Georgia four minutes into the second. This time, she scored on a header off a pass into the box from defender BK Harris.

Having a player scoring a lot of goals is good for the team in multiple ways, McAlpine. The goals are helping Georgia win in the moment, but they’re also going to force upcoming opponents to pay more attention to Denigan, which should open things up for the other scoring threats.

“You definitely want to get her flowing, because now she’s going to be the play on the scouting report. Now it’s, who else can step up and take over some of that momentum and find ways to score and cause problems? As teams start to close in on her, we have to have that next person step up,” McAlpine said.

“I thought at times in the game, we were able to stretch people out and really stretch out the defense. (Michigan) did a really good job of making it difficult, but we found three moments and took advantage.”

Denigan and the Bulldogs will try to keep rolling Thursday when they host North Florida.

Assistant Sports Communications Director John Frierson is the staff writer for the UGA Athletic Association and curator of the ITA Men’s Tennis Hall of Fame. You can find his work at: Frierson Files.