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Danielle Ruth Fotopoulos (née Garrett; born March 24, 1976) is an American soccer coach and former player. Fotopoulos holds the all-time National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I records for goals and points, and was a member of the University of Florida team that won the 1998 NCAA women's soccer championship, and also the United States national team that won the 1999 FIFA Women's World Cup. She was the head coach of the Eckerd women's soccer team until 2022.
 Fotopoulos with the United States national team | |||
| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Danielle Ruth Fotopoulos | ||
| Birth name | Danielle Ruth Garrett[1] | ||
| Date of birth | March 24, 1976 | ||
| Place of birth | Camp Hill, Pennsylvania | ||
| Height | 5 ft 11 in (1.80 m) | ||
| Position(s) | Forward | ||
| Team information | |||
Current team | Eckerd College (coach) | ||
| Youth career | |||
| 1990–1993 | Lyman High School | ||
| College career | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| 1994–1995 | SMU Mustangs | 44 | (52) |
| 1996–1998 | Florida Gators | 48 | (66) |
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| 1998 | Tampa Bay Extreme | 4 | (6) |
| 2001–2003 | Carolina Courage | 53 | (27) |
| 2005 | Central Florida Krush | ||
| International career | |||
| 1996–2005 | United States | 35 | (16) |
| Managerial career | |||
| 2004 | LSU | ||
| 2010–2022 | Eckerd | ||
| *Club domestic league appearances and goals | |||
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Fotopoulos was born in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania in 1976, the daughter of Bill and Donna Garrett. She grew up in Altamonte Springs, Florida, and attended Lyman High School in Longwood, Florida from 1990 to 1994. While in high school, she was a varsity letterman in six different sports—basketball, cross country, soccer, tennis, swimming and track & field. Her high school soccer team won three Florida state championships during her four years on the team.
Fotopoulos initially attended Southern Methodist University (SMU) in Dallas, Texas, where she played for the SMU Mustangs soccer team from 1994 to 1995. After her sophomore year, she transferred from SMU to the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida, where she played for coach Becky Burleigh's new Florida Gators women's soccer team for two seasons. She suffered an ACL injury before the start of the 1997 season and returned to the Gators for her senior year in 1998. She helped the Gators win the 1998 NCAA Women's Soccer Championship, scoring the winning goal against North Carolina in the final of the NCAA soccer tournament. During her 1996 and 1998 seasons with the Gators, the team also won both the Southeastern Conference (SEC) regular season and tournament championships, and she was twice recognized as the SEC Player of the Year. Fotopoulos finished her college career as the NCAA's all-time leader in goals (118) and points (284). She was the 1998–99 recipient of the Honda Sports Award for Soccer, recognizing her as the outstanding collegiate women's soccer player of the year.[2][3]
She graduated from Florida with a bachelor's degree in 1999, and was inducted into the University of Florida Athletic Hall of Fame as a "Gator Great" in 2008.[4][5]
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Fotopoulos played professionally with the Carolina Courage of the Women's United Soccer Association, winning the league championship in 2002. She was also a member of the United States Women's National Soccer team.
Fotopoulos is married to former Louisiana State University (LSU) women's soccer team head coach George Fotopoulos. In 2004, she served as co-head coach with her husband at LSU.[6][7] They finished with an 8–11–1 overall record (2–8–1 in the SEC).[8] In 2006, she became an assistant coach for the Florida Gators soccer team at the University of Florida, her alma mater. She currently lives in Tampa, Florida with her husband and their four children. She coached multiple teams at the Tampa Bay United Soccer Club and currently coaches at Florida Premier FC where she is the GIRLS ECNLR Director. She is also a partner for the semi-pro team, Tampa Bay Hellenic; her husband is currently the head coach. From 2010 to 2022, Fotopoulos was the head of coach of the NCAA Division II women's soccer team at Eckerd College in St. Petersburg, Florida from 2010 until stepping down in August 2022.[9]
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Individual awards and honors
- WUSA All-Star team selection: 2003
- Second-team All-WUSA: 2002
- Honda Award: 1998[10]
- NSCAA National Player of the Year: 1998
- ESPN.com/Soccer Times National Player of the Year: 1998
- Soccer America Player of the Year: 1998
- NCAA Final Four Offensive MVP: 1998
- Southeastern Conference Player of the Year: 1996, 1998
- All-American: 1995, 1996, 1998
- SEC Tournament MVP: 1996
Team honors
- FIFA Women's World Cup (1999)
- Women's United Soccer Association Founders Cup (2002)
- NCAA Women's Soccer Championship (1999)
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College
| Year | Team | GP/GS | Goals | Assists | Total Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1994 | SMU | 20/19 | 20 | 5 | 45 |
| 1995 | SMU | 24/23 | 32 | 19 | 85 |
| 1996 | Florida | 22/22 | 34 | 13 | 83 |
| 1997 | Florida | did not play | |||
| 1998 | Florida | 26/26 | 32 | 11 | 75 |
| Totals | 92/90 | 118 | 48 | 284 | |
WUSA
| Year | Team | GP/GS | Goals | Assists | Total Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 | Carolina Courage | 21/21 | 9 | 5 | 23 |
| 2002 | Carolina Courage | 21/20 | 11 | 10 | 32 |
| 2003 | Carolina Courage | 12/12 | 7 | 6 | 20 |
| Totals | 54/53 | 27 | 21 | 75 | |
W-League
| Year | Team | GP | Goals |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1998 | Tampa Bay Extremes | 4 | 6 |
| 2005 | Central Florida Krush | 9 | |
| Totals | 15 | ||
National team
| Year | GP/GS | Goals | Assists | Total Points |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1996 | 2/1 | 3 | 2 | 8 |
| 1997 | 6/0 | 1 | 1 | 3 |
| 1998 | 1/0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 1999 | 17/1 | 7 | 4 | 18 |
| 2000 | did not play | |||
| 2001 | ||||
| 2002 | 4/0 | 1 | 0 | 2 |
| 2003 | did not play | |||
| 2004 | ||||
| 2005 | 5/1 | 4 | 0 | 8 |
| Totals | 35/3 | 16 | 7 | 39 |
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