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Crazy to think that Taylor Moreno never started a lacrosse game in high school.
The Huntington alumna — a three-time Inside Lacrosse All-American for North Carolina — is USA Lacrosse Magazine’s preseason Goalie of the Year.
Moreno is entering her sixth and final spring with the Tar Heels in Chapel Hill — she didn’t play her freshman year due to a knee injury and she received another year of eligibility after the 2020 season went bust due to COVID-19.
The preseason honor comes well-deserved for the grad student. Consider the top of Moreno’s résumé:
• Received the 2021 National Goalkeeper of the Year award from the Intercollegiate Women’s Lacrosse Coaches Association in June.
• Finished second in the nation in goals against average (6.65) and save percentage (.549) in 2021, helping lead North Carolina to the ACC championship and reach the NCAA semifinals.
• Twice named most valuable player of the ACC tournament, including during her freshman season.
• Named by Inside Lacrosse as the No. 7 overall women’s or men’s player (and the top goalie of either gender) in the nation for the 2022 season.
• Boasts a career record of 48-6 in the cage, and has started 54 consecutive games.
At Huntington High School, Moreno earned 10 varsity letters in five different sports: soccer, football, basketball, winter track and lacrosse. She was Huntington’s first-ever female football player, converting 13 of 13 point-after-touchdown attempts as the team’s placekicker in the fall 2015 season.
Amazingly though, Moreno was never a starter in high school lacrosse. As a sophomore and junior, she was stuck behind then-upperclassman Anna Tesorero, who eventually played for Stony Brook University. Moreno was unable to play her senior season after tearing her ACL playing basketball that year for Huntington.
Already an accomplished graphic designer, Moreno designed the “EQUALITY.” warmup shirts she and her Tar Heel teammates wore in 2021 to underscore the social justice ideals of the team. Additionally, she designed the mural the team symbolically touches before the start of each home game.
Making further news this fall, Moreno partnered with the digital media company Postgame to launch college women’s lacrosse’s first Non-Fungible Token. The NFT features Moreno in her goalkeeper helmet, a chrome signature and a golden No. 30. Click here to check it out.
A series of 25 of the tokens sold out. But one is available for resale — at a whopping $1,500 asking price.
Here’s what USA Lacrosse Magazine had to say about Moreno when it named her its preseason Goalie of the Year.
‘Emotional leader’
“A Tewaaraton Award finalist and the 2021 IWLCA National Goalkeeper of the Year, Moreno is an athletic netminder who saved 54.9 percent of shots last spring. She finished second in the nation with a career-best 6.65 goals against average and is an emotional leader for a hungry North Carolina team.” –– USA Lacrosse Magazine
USA Lacrosse MAGAZINE
Taylor Moreno’s journey to the Women’s Lacrosse Final Four is one of patience and resilience
SB Nation
