Women's Soccer WCC Columnist Jeff Faraudo

WCC Hall Of Honor: Danielle Slaton

Santa Clara women’s soccer coach Jerry Smith has helped mold Hall of Famers and World Champions, a long list of talented players that includes the likes of Brandi Chastain and Aly Wagner.

Asked to identify the important player he’s had at Santa Clara, Smith didn’t hesitate. “Danielle Slaton,” he said. “As a student-athlete role model, as a representative of Santa Clara University in any setting . . . she made a lasting impact on our program.

“All those people are so awesome and motivating and inspiring. Danielle has a little something different that is a perfect balance of confidence, brilliance, humility, accountability, servant-leadership.”

Now 42 and married with two young sons, Slaton has done it all — on and off the soccer pitch — and her body of work has earned her a spot in the West Coast Conference’s 2023 Hall of Honor class. 

She and honorees from the WCC’s other nine campuses — all of them women this year in celebration of the 50th anniversary of Title IX — will be recognized on Saturday during the University Credit Union WCC Basketball Tournament in Las Vegas.

Slaton’s credentials are impeccable and substantial. She was a three-time first-team All-America defender in 1999-2000-2001, won an Olympic silver medal at the 2000 Sydney Games as the youngest player on the U.S. roster, and led the Broncos to their first NCAA championship in 2001, when she also was named the sport’s national scholar-athlete of the year after graduating magna cum laude.

A native of nearby San Jose, Slaton said she owes a lifetime debt to her college experience. “I am not who I am without Santa Clara,” she said. “I think of what I learned in soccer and the doors the have been opened because of soccer. Santa Clara taught me to go out in the world and do. I learned that I have to roll up my sleeves and get my hands dirty and do the work.”

Slaton was a star from the moment she walked into campus, and in her sophomore season of 1999 the Broncos fielded a team that Smith suggests might have been the best in college history. Santa Clara began the season with 23 straight victories, outscoring its opponents 108 to 9. They were ranked No. 1 much of the season and outscored their first three NCAA Tournament foes by a combined 12-0 margin.

“We crushed everybody. We beat UCLA 7-0 in the Sweet 16,” Smith said. “We were just awesome — probably the best team I’ve ever coached.”

But the Broncos lost 1-0 Notre Dame in the national semifinals, the second year in a row they came up one win shy of reaching the championship game. “It was one of the best teams I’ve ever played on,” Slaton said. “To lose to Notre Dame in that way was just gut-wrenching.”

Two years later, the Broncos went 23-2 and earned their first national title, beating 16-time and reigning NCAA champion North Carolina 1-0 in the finals on a goal by Wagner. “It was like a Hollywood ending, a Cinderella ending,” said Slaton, who was chosen the College Cup’s Defensive MVP. “I   don’t know how I could have scripted it any better. It was a dream ending to my college experience.”

In between the magical seasons of 1999 and 2001 was a year that Smith says highlights the value Slaton brought to the program. She missed the first 10 games of the 2000 season while playing at the Sydney Olympics, and the Broncos struggled to a 6-3-1 start to their season without her, eventually ousted from the NCAAs after a 2-1 overtime loss to Notre Dame in the quarterfinals.

A couple years later, as Smith tried to make sense of the ups and downs of going 23-1 then 16-7-1 then 23-2 over three seasons, he found one common denominator. 

“What we determined was we certainly missed Danielle as a player. She was a great player for us. What we missed (more) was her leadership,” Smith said. “Danielle the leader was impossible to navigate. I can’t say it any more clearly than that.”

As a result, Smith began a leadership training program for his athletes to make sure there was no a void in that area again. “We were spoiled. Danielle Slaton came in and she was the best leader in our program, maybe including the coaching staff,” Smith said. “Danielle Slaton is the reason we started it and have it today.”

Slaton’s combination of talent and leadership showed at Santa Clara from the start of her career (1998 WCC Freshman of the Year) to the finish (2001 WCC Defender of the Year). She was a first-team All-WCC selection all four seasons.

The Sydney Olympics was an eye-opening experience for Slaton, the only college player on the team. Her teammates included Mia Hamm, Julie Foudy and Chastain. “It was an awesome opportunity to play with my heroes, women who were literally posters on my wall growing up,” she said.

By 2003, she was a national team veteran, helping the Americans to a World Cup bronze medal on home soil. “In the U.S., we have this Olympic fever, which is so great,” she said. “Amongst the soccer community, there’s nothing like the World Cup.”

As a professional, Slaton was named Defender of the Year while helping the Carolina Courage win the 2002 championship in the Women’s United States Soccer Association. She also played a season in Lyon, France but a bad right knee ended her career shortly thereafter.

Her post-playing days have been busy and rewarding. While serving as an assistant coach at Northwestern, she completed her masters degree in sports management. Since then, besides starting a family with husband John Albers, Slaton has done extensive broadcasting work, toured the world through the U.S. State Department to conduct clinics for children and worked at her alma mater as Director of Community Engagement and Professional Development and in the school of education.

She has been part of the TV broadcast team for the Women’s World Cup and the Olympics, and currently is doing MLS games through the Apple network. In 2018 she was a member of the first all-female team to call a game in any of the major men’s professional leagues, working an MLS matchup between the New England Revolution and D.C.United.

As meaningful as that was, Slaton also gets great satisfaction from the trips she took to Jordan, Paraguay, Malaysia, South Africa and India to teach the game to young children. “I feel very passionate about sport being a way for us to learn life lessons,” she said. “You talk about feeling fulfilled, feeling grateful, it puts your life in perspective.”

Smith said Slaton has a naturally healthy perspective through humility, self-awareness and accountability that benefits everyone around her. During her playing days at Santa Clara, even as a star on the Olympic team, Slaton took the time to get to know each one of her teammates.

“She didn’t do that as a means to an end,” Smith said. “It’s just who she is. It’s who she is on the field, it’s who she is off the field.”