Program
Emcee: Jen Cooper (Rice ’90)
Friday, January 30, 2026
Location: Kraft Hall
12:00p Registration
1:00p Afternoon Session 1
1:00p Summit Welcome
Industry Keynote
1:10p Carlos Vela (Sporting Director, LD Alajuelense)
“Sporting Director: Putting Data into Action”
1:50p Hayden Van Brewer and Matt Cohen (SkillCorner)
“But Are They Asked to Do It? Using Change of Direction Ability to Assess Pressers”
2:15p Interactive Round Table Discussions #1
3:00p Afternoon Break
Enjoy coffee, tea and pastries from Common Bond
3:30p Afternoon Session 2
3:30p US Soccer Panel, featuring
Vicky Jepson, Kaleb Parker, Natasha Patel & John Muller (Moderator)
4:15p Oliver Miller-Farrell (Assistant General Manager, Nashville SC)
“From Collection to Decision”
4:40p Andrew Bates (Teamworks)
“Practical Uses of DuckDB”
5:05p Interactive Round Table Discussions #2, presented by 
5:50p Friday Content Concludes
6:00p Networking Reception: Women in Soccer Analytics
All Summit participants are welcome. RSVP is required by January 23.
Saturday, January 31, 2026
Location: Duncan Hall
8:30a Breakfast and Registration
Enjoy breakfast tacos, pastries, coffee and tea from The Cottage Grocery
9:00a Morning Sesssion 1
9:00a Saturday Welcome
Academic Keynote
9:10a Tim Swartz (Professor of Statistics & Actuarial Science, Simon Fraser University)
“Soccer Insights via Tracking Data”
9:50a Interactive Round Table Discussions #3
10:35a Morning Break
Enjoy breakfast tacos, pastries, coffee and tea from The Cottage Grocery
11:05a Morning Session 2
11:05a Debashis Mondal (Associate Professor of Statistics & Data Science, Washington University)
“Spatial Hierarchical Item Response Theory for Soccer Shot Analysis”
11:30a Maddalena Torricelli and Brennan Klein (Northeastern University)
“The Team Support Network: Quantifying Off-Ball Impact in Women’s Elite Soccer through Tracking Data”
11:40a Guanyu Hu (Associate Professor of Statistics & Probability, Michigan State University)
“How Much Does Home Field Advantage Matter in Soccer Games? A Causal Inference Approach”
12:05p Meredith Shea, Miles Sondergaard Jensen, Gaku Aihara (Vassar College)
“Off-Ball Run Value: Quantifying the Quality of Off-Ball Runs”
12:15p Kendall Thomas (Doctoral Candidate, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)
“Movement Dynamics in Elite Female Soccer Athletes: The Quantile Cube Approach”
12:40p Lunch
Enjoy a selection of lunch options from Local Foods
1:40p Afternoon Session 1
1:40p Devin Pleuler (Sr Director of Research & Development, Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment)
“Building Unfair Advantages: Analytics at Multi-Sport Organizations”
2:05p Lou Zhou (Rice University)
“GPS: A Metric for Evaluating Goalkeeper Positioning”
2:15p Maddalena Torricelli (Northeastern University)
“Harder, Shorter, Sharper, Forward: A Comparison of Women’s and Men’s Elite Football Gameplay”
2:35p David Almona (Centre College), Natalie Rayce (Carnegie Mellon University)
“Forced Turnover: Evaluating Pressing Effectiveness in Soccer”
2:45p Adebisi Akinyemi, Dillon Stewart, Lennie Waite (HITE EQ)
“Which Athletes are ‘Mentality Monsters’?: Clustering Athletes by their Psychological Attributes”
3:05p Afternoon Break
Enjoy coffee, tea and treats from Tiny’s Milk & Cookies
3:35p Afternoon Session 2
3:35p Susana Ferreras (Data Analytics Lead, Arsenal FC)
“Decision-making at Arsenal”
4:00p John Daniels, Isaac Araoz, Tzu-Ying Chen (Auburn University)
“Optimal Defensive Movement Against Counterattacks”
4:10p Daniel Castro, Colin Scifert, Jan-Anders Mansson (Purdue University)
“Adversity Flags in Soccer Based on Individual Spatial Ownership and Pressure Received”
4:30p Adam Endress (Oregon State University)
“Valuing the Effect of Off-Ball Runs in Increasing Dribble Success”
4:40p Jonathan Pipping-Gamón, Tianshu Feng, Paul Sabin (University of Pennsylvania)
“Beyond Expected Goals: A Probabilistic Framework for Shot Occurrences in Soccer”
5:00p Luke Blommesteyn (University of Western Ontario)
“A Geometric Framework for Measuring Preventive Defensive Positioning in Women’s Soccer”
5:10p Expected Own Goals Live Podcast
5:50p Summit Concludes
Disclaimer: Schedule is subject to change
