Stanford Women's Soccer Moves Up Rankings After Dominant Start to 2025

Stanford women’s soccer is climbing up the rankings, just a week into the season. Per the official NCAA rankings, the Cardinal opened up the season at number seven in the country. The six above were: North Carolina, Notre Dame, Florida State, Duke, USC, and Arkansas.

Stanford took that number seven ranking personally in their opening matchups against USF and No. 16 Santa Clara. They began their season on Thursday, where they took down the San Francisco Dons 7-0, led by Jasmine Aikey’s stardom. After a 1-0 win the year prior, this one was huge to begin the year.

Thursday was quite the showing, but Sunday may have put the entire college soccer world on notice for what's to come. The Broncos, who are a proud soccer program with a national championship in recent years, looked ready after coming off a 3-0 win against San Jose State. However, that was not the case.

Allie Montoya and Elise Evans starred in a dominant 5-1 Cardinal victory. Stanford dominated the game, controlling the possession game, which was most notable in their 28 shots (13 on goal) compared to Santa Clara's two total shots, one of which resulted in a goal. That Broncos goal came at 88:51, and Stanford's Milly Bray answered right back with a goal of her own at 89:15.

Stanford, scoring 12 goals and allowing just one in their first two games, looks like one of, if not the top team in America, and Top Drawer Soccer surely agrees.

Their week two college soccer rankings put Stanford in the top spot, followed by Florida State, Duke, UCLA, Tennessee, North Carolina, Iowa, Notre Dame, Virginia Tech, and Penn State to round out the top 10.

Entering the season, Stanford was listed as the fifth best ACC team, despite being seventh in the country. Now they're number one, and ACC teams follow. The overall list shows eight ACC teams in the top 25, being #1 Stanford, #2 Florida State, #3 Duke, #6 North Carolina, #8 Notre Dame, #9 Virginia Tech, #17 Wake Forest, and #24 Virginia.

The NCAA also released their own re-rankings, and Stanford ended up No. 2 on their list. Either way, the Cardinal have surely made some waves early on in the 2025 soccer season.