Gianna Christiansen's senior season features scoring surge for Arizona soccer

As a freshman, Christiansen had no goals and two assists. Her sophomore year she had a goal and an assist.

As a junior, it was three goals and no assists.

So far this season: eight goals and four assists.

“Honestly, I don't know the tactical things that are different, but I just know overall that this is the best team that we've had all four years," she said. "I would say, offensively, just as a unit, every individual I think is extremely strong so that's honestly allowing me to get more up in the attack and especially our defense, too."

“We've been working four years on really strengthening our defense," she added. "I'm able to get up more, like I said, and get in those goals scoring spaces and getting all those opportunities that I did get in the past, but I'm definitely getting a lot more looks now.”

The Wildcats (10-5-2, 5-4-1 Big 12) travel to play ASU (8-6-3, 3-6-1) Friday night in the regular season finale.

UA head coach Becca Moros agreed that the team playing better offensively has led to more chances for all and thus more goals for Christiansen.

As of Thursday morning Christiansen was tied for eighth in the Big 12 in goals with 8, two behind the leader. She was also tied for second in game winning goals with .235 per game.

Her 8 goals this season is tied for 10th in school history.

UA is fifth in the Big 12 in goals with 30.

Christiansen said it “feels amazing” to have a break out year the same season the Wildcats have had one of their best. Arizona is reached double digit wins for the first time since 2019 and for the eighth time in the program’s 30 year history

The Wildcats went 5-13 in Moros’ first season, then went 8-7-3 in 2022 and then 6-8-5.

“I've seen this program get built from really the ground up with Becca coming in with me when I was a freshman,” Christiansen said. “It's really amazing, it, like, gives me the chills just thinking about it, that we really were able to go from averaging, I think, like one to two goals per game to now this season, like three to four goals per game,” she added.

On Oct. 16 Christiansen won the Big 12 Co-Offensive Player of the Week, the Laguna Hills, Calif. native's first conference award of her career.

“Gianna’s been great,” Moros said. “I think she's a great soccer player, she had a great freshman year, she’s been great since she got here.

“I think this year, she's been able to do some things, more things than she's been able to do another years, but those things have always been there, she just continues to grow and develop,” she added. “She loves the game and she's very clever, so she's had a really good year for us.”

Christiansen committed to Arizona as a high school freshman and stayed with the UA after then head coach Tony Amato left for Florida in 2021 before her freshman year of college.

She said Moros is the best coach she ever had.

“Once we found out that we were getting Becca and kind of knowing like her background playing for professional soccer, I was honestly extremely excited because I myself wanna play professional soccer,” Christiansen said. “So I kind of was very happy that I had a coach that had that background.”

Corner kicks

• The Wildcats have won eight of their last nine against their pitch fork waving rivals, including 2-1 last year at home.

• “We do this tradition where we literally don't eat with any forks throughout the whole this whole week,” Christiansen said. “So I'm literally trying to eat like noodles with a spoon and a knife, it’s really difficult, but I think that kind of just shows how committed we are to beating ASU.”