{"id":17647,"date":"2013-01-16T16:37:03","date_gmt":"2013-01-16T21:37:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/?p=17647"},"modified":"2013-01-16T16:37:03","modified_gmt":"2013-01-16T21:37:03","slug":"oreilly-happy-to-be-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/?p=17647","title":{"rendered":"O’Reilly Happy to be Back"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The<\/a>

The Breakers will welcome back Heather O’Reilly after the U.S. Women’s National Team veteran spent portions of the summer with the club last summer. (Photo: Chris Aduama\/aduama.com)<\/p><\/div>\n

It’s not everyday that a club can pick up a player with three Olympic gold medals in her trophy case. But that’s precisely what the Boston Breakers did when they selected Heather O\u2019Reilly in last week’s National Women\u2019s Soccer League allocation draft.<\/p>\n

Granted, O’Reilly is no stranger to the Breakers organization. She spent portions of last summer with the club in preparation for the 2012 Summer Olympics.<\/p>\n

\u201cI only played a few games (for Boston), but I definitely got a sense of what this organization is about,\u201d said O\u2019Reilly, who played in two games for the Breakers last year, during a phone interview on Monday. “My experience with the Breakers, although brief, was very enjoyable. I enjoyed the fans, the coaching staff. [But having played for the Breakers last year] will make my transition a bit easier.\u201d<\/p>\n

O\u2019Reilly arrived in Boston with the understanding that her contributions would be limited due to her Olympic obligations with the U.S. Women’s National Team. Nevertheless, the Breakers got O\u2019Reilly for a few weeks, allowing some of its younger players to train and interact with one of the best players in the country.<\/p>\n

The Breakers organization showed their gratitude to the former North Carolina Tar Heel by honoring her at halftime of their Jul. 6 match against the New England Mutiny. It was a fitting farewell to the Olympic star, who left for Olympic training two days later.<\/p>\n

Now, without a major summer tournament on tap, the Breakers are hoping to get a full season’s worth of O’Reilly’s trademark playmaking abilities.<\/p>\n

Joining O’Reilly on the Breakers roster are fellow U.S. teammates Heather Mitts and Sydney LeRoux, as well as a number of CONCACAF rivals. Among them: Canadian internationals Rhian Wilkinson and Adriana Leon as well as Mexican internationals Anisa Guajardo and Cecilia Santiago.<\/p>\n

“It’s an interesting dynamic,\u201d said O\u2019Reilly of playing with her continental rivals for the Breakers next season. \u201cI can’t even guess how many games I’ve played against Wilkinson on the National Team. I’m excited to have her on my side this time.”<\/p>\n

Re-uniting with Mitts and LeRoux should make the transition smooth O\u2019Reilly, who won her third gold medal with both players in London.<\/p>\n

Mitts is an established central defender who played for the Breakers during their days in the now-defunct Women’s Professional Soccer.<\/p>\n

“Mitts is somebody who is just the perfect teammate,” O’Reilly said. “She’s always going to be fit. She’s always going to be ready to go. She provides so much to the team environment.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, LeRoux is a rising star. In 27 appearances with the U.S., the 22-year-old striker scored 14 goals, leaving a lasting impression with her soon-to-be Breakers teammate.<\/p>\n

\u201cComing off the bench [for the U.S.], she pumped in 12 goals,” O’Reilly said. “That was all off the bench! I’m really proud of Syd as a player. She’s handled herself very well on and off the field. And, she’s entertaining.”<\/p>\n

The Breakers are likely to add some players from last year\u2019s WPSL Elite roster including U.S. national team players Cat Whitehill and Leslie Osbourne, last year\u2019s team captain.<\/p>\n

Other possible returnees include Taryn Hemmnings, who can play as either an attacker or central defender, Katie Schoepfer, who scored eight goals last season, and Australian internationals Kyah Simon and Tameka Butt.<\/p>\n

As for O’Reilly, she’s already looking forward to returning to Beantown and working with whoever else the club brings in for 2013.<\/p>\n

\u201cI got a sense of what the Breakers are about (last year),” O’Reilly said. “I like Lisa Cole as coach, she runs good training sessions and she is very organized. It\u2019s going to be competitive.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Heather O’Reilly will return for a second season with the Breakers after the club selected her in the NWSL allocation draft last week. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[23,204],"tags":[1282,205,1309,1287],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17647"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=17647"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17647\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17668,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17647\/revisions\/17668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=17647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=17647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=17647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}