By Chad Conine

Tribune-Herald staff writer

Marci Jobson came to the Baylor soccer program intent on breaking down the Bears before she built them back up.

Given Jobson’s credentials, the Bears welcomed the baptism by hard work with open arms.

“They came in and they worked us really hard and kind of changed our mentality a little bit,” Baylor senior Carolyn Lynch said. “And it worked.

“I feel like Marci has had the best training for lots of years. So it’s easy for her to copy some of that and use some of that.”

Jobson, who played on the U.S. national team from 2005-2007 and played professional club soccer for most of the last 10 years, has kept an eye on her friends on the U.S. Olympic team in China this week as she prepares the Bears to open their schedule.

She watched as the U.S. defeat Canada, 2-1, in overtime early Friday morning. Though Jobson has been sending encouraging e-mails to her national team pals, her focus has been on training a young Baylor squad.

The Bears play SMU, Jobson’s alma mater, in an exhbition game at 7 tonight at Betty Lou Mays Field before officially opening their schedule on the road at UTEP on Friday.

A year ago, the Bears won their season-opening exhibition and six of their first nine contests before they wilted in Big 12 play on the way to a 7-10-2 mark.

So Jobson’s first objective, beginning in the spring, was to rebuild the team to be physically and mentally tougher.

“I’ve always been a blue-collar player,” Jobson said. “I made it to the national-team level, not because I was overly talented, but because I outworked a lot of people around me.

“I told our girls, ‘Hey, a year from now, you’re going to know what it means to work harder than anybody else out there.’ ”

Jobson’s career trajectory as a player proves her toughness.

After winning two state championships in high school, Jobson made two stops in college career, first at Wisconsin and then SMU.

She was a standout for the Badgers and Mustangs, making first-team all-Central Region as a sophomore at Wisconsin, then all-WAC in two seasons at SMU.

Long road to the top

Although she tallied 87 points in her college career, that success didn’t translate to an immediate bump up to the national team.

Jobson played pro soccer for teams in Germany, Chicago, Atlanta and Charlotte during a eight-year span before her career brought her to international competition.

In 2005, at age 29, Jobson became the second oldest player to make her first appearance for the U.S. women’s national team.

She ended up playing defensive center for the U.S. for three seasons and became the oldest U.S. player to make her Women’s World Cup debut in 2007.

Jobson, who began her coaching career in 2005 at Northern Illinois, said coaching and playing for the national team meant having two demanding full-time jobs.

“Both take 100 percent of your energy,” Jobson said. “I really feel like God kind of gifted me during the time with the ability to do both.”

The dual role culminated with Jobson playing in the Women’s World Cup last fall and at the same time guiding Northern Illinois to a 10-5-5 record.

Having seen both of her ventures flourish the more effort she put forth, Jobson brought that experience into rebuilding a Baylor program that hasn’t had a winning season since 2000.

“I think a big focus for our coaching staff for the spring was to start to introduce maybe a little bit of a different mentality for this team,” Jobson said. “I’m a big believer that whenever you’re trying to rebuild a program — which, I think it’s obvious when we’ve looked at the past results of Baylor for quite a while, that we need to rebuild the program — you really got to kind of break some things down before you can build it back up.”

Jobson retired from playing, not because the new Baylor post required it, but because her ankles were beginning to feel the strain of her long career.

No regrets

The timing of that decision might have kept Jobson out of the Beijing Olympics, but she’s not asking herself “What if?”

“Sure, everybody’s always going to say it’s an Olympics, it’s so cool,” Jobson said. “But I think you know when the timing is right.

“I’ve been here. I’ve been so into my team.”

The Bears return two of their top four goal scorers in Beckah Brady and Lotto Smith.

But Jobson and her coaching staff — which includes her husband, Paul Jobson, Chuck Codd and Bret Hall, all of whom have either pro or international coaching experience — are focusing on defense.

“I was a tackler, a defensive type of player,” Jobson said. “Paul was an attacker. Chuck was a defender. Bret was kind of a defender, but he was a very good attacking defender.

“I think for all of us, we always want to make sure we get our defense right before we start worrying about scoring a billion goals. Because if you score six goals and give up seven, it doesn’t matter. You lose anyway.”

Jobson said this season she is focused on laying a foundation instead of wins and losses, though she did say she’d like the team to be more competitive in the Big 12 after the Bears won just one conference game a year ago.

The main thing, Jobson said, is for the Bears to make progress, and that means developing qualities that don’t show up on a roster or stat sheet.

“With girls, that camaraderie is very important,” Jobson said. “I’ve grown to understand so much the importance of the heart factor and the mental side of the game. I think you can be a very average soccer player and you can play way beyond yourself if you have a strong heart.”

cconine@wacotrib.com

757-5711

—— BAYLOR VS. SMU ——

When: 7 tonight

Where: Baylor’s Betty Lou Mays Field

Note: Admission is free for the Baylor-SMU exhibition game. The Bears start the regular season at 7 p.m., Friday at UTEP.