by Riley Bauling
Daily Lobo
Jeff Rowland isn't going to a fancy ball anytime soon. He's not missing a glass slipper. He doesn't have wicked stepsisters.
But the rags-to-riches part, he's got that down.
Rowland, a senior on the Lobo men's soccer team and the second leading scorer in the country last year, came out of high school unrecruited and unwanted.
"I didn't have anyone come recruit me and ask me to come to their team," Rowland said. "I wasn't a big name. I didn't do anything super special."
UNM head coach Jeremy Fishbein had no reason to be impressed.
"He didn't show us he was a guy that was going to make an impact on the team," Fishbein said. "We were kind of wavering on whether we would keep him or not."
But Rowland chalked up his hands. He wasn't letting the prospect of college soccer slip away that easily.
"He was like, 'We don't have room for anyone. We already have 12 recruits or whatever we had that year. Maybe come back in the spring,'" Rowland said. "And I was like, 'Look, just let me play. I'll do anything. Pretty much just give me a chance.'"
That chance came after Fishbein saw him score a goal from more than 30 yards out in the State Cup Finals.
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But Rowland's 30-yard blast didn't come easy. It was a project eight months in the making.
The forward tore his left anterior cruciate ligament more than a year before the finals and spent eight months rehabilitating.
After missing his entire senior year of high school soccer, he toiled away during the club season struggling to get his knee into shape.
"It was more of a blessing in disguise," Rowland said about the knee injury. "I didn't know how much I really liked it until it was gone, and when I realized it was gone, I realized I didn't know where I'd be without soccer."
Taking Rowland was a no-risk gamble for Fishbein. After all, he would be the 27th guy on the team anyway and not on scholarship.
Three years and a scholarship later, Rowland doesn't even need to plead for more playing time.
He was named a Hermann Trophy candidate this year - an award given to the nation's best male soccer player. He was a first-team All-American last year, and with 19 goals and seven assists, he broke the UNM single-season scoring record.
Fishbein doesn't deny he doubted Rowland. He doesn't deny the payoff from his gamble was like putting your mortgage down at the poker table and winning with jack high.
"He said he was going to be a big-time player. He had all the confidence in the world. He had some bad luck and he hadn't gotten the breaks some other players had, and we'd be making a mistake if we didn't keep him," Fishbein said. "And he was right."
