November 3, 1998

By Josh Mitchell
Diamondback staff writer

Terrapin women's soccer senior defender Emily Janss blushes whenever she views a game tape.

"I don't realize how small I am until I watch a game tape," said Janss, who is 5 feet 2 inches tall. "Then I'm like, 'Oh my, I'm tiny.' I'm like a little ant running around out there."

And of course, a lot of jokes come along with being short. Her teammates tell her she needs to climb a ladder to make a header. In practice, they look over her and say, "Do you see anyone?"

But no one likes to play against Janss in practice. In fact, despite her size, a common sentiment among coaches and teammates exists: Janss is as tough as they get.

Take the national semifinal she played with her club team in 1995. Just before halftime, Janss collided with a player in the air as both went for the ball.

"When I finally got up, I ran around and realized I was playing soccer," she said.

Nothing stopped her from playing the rest of the match. She even scored.

"Emily got rocked hard, and she just kept playing," said Janss' mother, Suzie. "But we could all tell there was just something about her game that was a little strange."

Suzie Janss embraced her daughter after the match.

"She didn't remember any of it; she didn't even know who they'd played," Suzie Janss said.

Janss learned from doctors after the game that she had been playing with a concussion.

"The fact that here's this kid playing with a concussion, but yet she got the job done and didn't even know she was doing it -- that's always stood out in my mind," Suzie Janss said.

"I always get jazzed about my size, but as long as I can get the job done it really doesn't matter," Janss said. "I might not win the header against [5-foot-11 Florida forward] Danielle Fotopoulos, but I can surely pressure her. I can give her an elbow to the back that will make her think the next time she passes me.

"If anybody's around the box, there's no way I want them to get the shot off. So if I have anything to do with it, I'll throw a foot in, a thigh, whatever."

Learning the men's game
Growing up in Brandon, Fla., Janss' parents enrolled her in a gymnastics camp when she was 7. She certainly had the petite figure for it, and after the first day, camp instructors told her parents, "We need this girl."

Janss didn't take to the classes, though. Instead, she would tug on her mother's shirt at her brother Peter's soccer practices and ask, "When can I play?"

So Janss joined an all-boys team -- there was no girls' squad in the area - and trained with then-9-year-old Peter's all boy's club team.

This is where Janss learned to be physical. She learned to slide tackle in front of a player, a tactic that sometimes results in a collision with the player. You must be "fearless" in order to accomplish it, her teammate Jackie Mynarski said.

"When I played with the boys, there were no regrets," Janss said. "I cleaned any guy's clock out if I wanted to and didn't think about the consequences. The guys would do the same to me, so I'd expect them to handle it when I did it to them."

"She's not going to back off from anybody," said Refik Kozic, Janss' personal trainer in Florida. "Sometimes you have players that make up for their size by having a really big heart and being brave."

Peter Janss, who played sweeper in high school, said playing in faster-paced men's games is what helped his sister the most.

"She has the uncanny ability to adapt to any circumstances she is put in athletically," he said. "Her best quality is her ability to see the game, her great vision for the development of the game."

George Fotopoulos, the women's head coach at Tampa and a coach of one of Janss' club teams, said none of Janss' games stood out in his mind because she was always at her best.

"I can tell you this one time [last year in a tournament in the Orange Bowl], she hit one of the greatest free kicks I've ever seen," Fotopoulos said. "The composure, the technique - it hit the top pigeon corner. It was awesome."

When Janss started playing the girls on her high school team, it was a tough adjustment, her mother said. Suzie Janss, an eighth grade American history teacher, said that while her daughter was getting lots of recognition, she clearly was not playing her best.

"Where's that burning zest of yours?" Suzie Janss asked her daughter.

Emily replied, "Mom, my biggest thrill is beating some boy and making him look stupid. I don't have that same determination to take the ball away from a girl."

At 12, Janss began working with Kozic to work on individual skills.

"She was at every practice," said Kozic, who worked with Janss twice a week throughout her high school career. "Sometimes the weather would be nasty, sometimes rain. But we never stopped working through the rain, the lightning. She would never back off from that."

Coming to campus
When Janss scored her first goal in a Terps jersey, Brad Janss, Emily's father, was so excited that the picture he took came out blurry due to his jumping up and down.

Actually, Janss hadn't touched the ball; the ball deflected off an opposing player into the net. But since Janss was closest she was credited with the goal.

Janss played in the midfield that year, which was her most productive season offensively with five goals and five assists. Coach Alan Kirkup moved Janss to backfield to fill the spot left vacant by the graduation of All-America defender Erin Taylor.

"She's an absolute stalwart," Kirkup said. "She can play a variety of different positions, but as a defender - that's probably her best position. She reads the game very well, is strong, intelligent, nice distribution, can make people play from around her -- great communication; she's pretty much the total package. Thankfully, soccer is one of those games where you don't have to be 6 feet, 250 pounds to be a good player. She's perhaps the epitome of that."

Janss originally committed to Southern Methodist (Texas), where Kirkup coached at the time. When Kirkup left to coach the Terps, Janss followed.

Brad Janss, a heart pacemaker salesman, said his family was impressed when Kirkup called all his recruits to inform them of his departure.

Janss helped lead the Terps to the NCAA Tournament the past two years, in which she started every game. She's only one of two Terp players to start every match the past two-plus seasons.

Janss made Second Team All-ACC and the All-ACC Tournament last season.

But the best thing about playing for campus isn't her personal accomplishments, Janss said, but her relationship with teammates.

"My teammates have a really big influence on me," Janss said. "They're going to make you want to play hard. If you see them getting the job done, you're going to want to get your job done. And if I don't do well, what good am I to the team?"

Mynarski, Janss' roommate the past three seasons, said Janss sometimes makes her laugh.

"She's taking this self-defense class, so she thinks she's karate girl," said Mynarski, who, at 5 feet 10 inches tall, dwarfs Janss. "She thinks she can throw everyone around and stuff."

Mynarski said Janss is one of the best defenders she's seen.

"That sounds like her; she's such a selfless player," Mynarski said of the game Janss played with a concussion. "Defender is not her absolute best position, but you never hear a word about her complaining in the back."

Playing defender allows Janss to be more physical.

"There are a lot of soft players; I just don't see what they're trying to do," Janss said. "Yeah, they can pass the ball and possess it, but they get knocked off the ball."