It wasn’t until the age of 11, while playing for her club team Thor/Ka that senior Rakel Hinriksdottir found her niche: soccer. Fast forward 13 years later, it is her drive and commitment as a leader for the women’s soccer team that made her the person she is today.
Growing up in northern part of Iceland in the town of Akureyri, Hinriksdottir was first introduced to the game of soccer when she was five, while playing with some friends. As a child, she said her experience as the only child was the ideal one for any child by living in a big house with a large yard and swimming pool. Hinriksdottir said soccer became serious after interacting with an acquaintance.
“It [becoming involved with soccer] sort of just started because a friend of mine asked me to come with her to practice and I just sort of made really good friends with the other girls on team,” Hinriksdottir said. “I have played for the same club team since then.”
After completing grade school at the age of 19, she worked at coffeehouse for a year and a half before attending a boarding school in Demark that held classes dealing with different types of students. It wasn’t until the spring of 2007 after speaking with a former UB soccer player Sandra Sigmundsdottir (1999-2002) told her that women’s soccer head coach Magnus Nilerud needed some additional players for the 2007 and Hinriksdottir agreed to try it out. She admits it was tough adjusting to the style of play shortly after joining the team.
“The first game we played was against Dominican [College] and I was just really confused as to if I really wanted to stay,” Hinriksdottir said. “I had remembered getting called out on so many times because we are used to much more contact at home.”
She points out after her freshman season; she started to like UB a lot and would go on to becoming a three time First Team All East Conference selection player and a captain for her final three years. One of her fondest memories as a Purple Knight was making the NCAA tournament last year after not thinking the team would make it at all and then getting revenge on Franklin Pierce University in the tournament after losing to them the previous year at Knights Field.
As for her major; Graphic Design, Hinriksdottir has enjoyed taking drawing, painting and illustration classes the most and mentioned that her advisor Gary Munch and graphic design professor Brian Miller have been two people that have helped her succeed in classroom because of their knowledge about design and the feedback they for provide her.
“Rakel’s a great design student who works hard on her concepts and on her production to come up with something new, interesting and useful,” Munch said. “She’s working on a couple of new typefaces this semester with me and it’s great to see her progress from sketch to final refinements.”
After graduation, Hinriksdottir, who finished her career playing in 85 games and recording 17 points (6 goals and 5 assists), is scheduled to play in September for her club team Thor/Ka in the European Championship League. She would also like to become a free lance designer or have her own studio in the capital city Reykjavik and tour India as well.
“Obviously I am not going to be the goal scorer but I just would like to be remembered as the player that would always work really hard even if I was having a bad game or not,” Hinriksdottir said. “I always have everything that I had and have the heart to drive the people.”