By Tyler Reis-Sanford
Any athlete at the top of their game will tell you that iron sharpens iron, that there’s no better way to get better than learning from, and competing with the best of the best.
Ottawa South United forward Francesca Mureta knows that first hand from her four consecutive championship runs with OSU, and will continue to contribute to a winning culture in 2025 as Mureta joins the three-time defending OUA women’s soccer champions at the University of Ottawa.
“I didn’t want to leave Ottawa,” Mureta says when asked about her choice to play for the Gee-Gees. “I’ve lived at home my whole life and I don’t think I wanted to have such a drastic change so quickly, but I’m going to be in residence, so I do get to be out of the house and fully experience it.”
Mureta didn’t take long to fall in love with the game of soccer, and has played since she was seven years old.
“I started off with ballet, but I quickly went over to soccer,” recounts the South Carleton High School grad. “I’ve played with a lot of the same girls for a while now, and it’s definitely helped us develop as a team.”
Mureta is a two-time provincial league champion with OSU in the Ontario Player Development League, and has made the OPDL Charity Shield finals every year of her career.
Read More: Show of Force: Deep OSU lineup earns repeat Ontario crown
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The fast and efficient forward excels at getting behind opposing defences with her athleticism and capitalizing on scoring chances set up by her teammates, says her longtime coach David Fox, who’s seen a great amount of growth over the last two seasons.
Whether it’s off a set play, where Mureta has great ball placement from the corner, or a vicious quick counter attack, she’s more than able to lead an attack and create her own chances too.
Over her time with OSU, Mureta developed into one of the OPDL’s leading scorers and she’s played an integral part in defining what it means to be a winner for the next generation of OSU stars, in her own unique way.
“She’s one of the quieter ones, she’s not super outspoken,” Fox notes. “But in terms of the group now, it’s her and three of the other ‘originals’. Younger players come in and look up to them, I think just by virtue of what they’ve accomplished.
“People know what the senior teams are doing, especially when we’ve had such success with those teams. Over the five or six years I’ve been here, it’s kind of driven the next age group on. The expectation in the club just keeps getting higher and higher.”
Fox says that Mureta’s 2007-born group is certainly one of the strongest generations OSU has seen, including several players who have represented Canada internationally or joined the Canadian women’s team’s National Development Centre in Toronto.
Many more are set to join varsity soccer programs this fall, including future U Sports players Grace O’Grady and Joellie Bouchard (both headed to the University of Waterloo), Kamille Irvin (Nipissing) and Isla Dupuis (Mount Allison), and NCAA-bound Brooklyn Menard (Long Island), Zoe Mclauchlan (Northern Illinois), Katie Ozard (Arizona State) and Bianca Hanisch (Purdue).
Read More: Inspired by her older sister, future Purdue player Bianca Hanisch kicks her way to NCAA soccer
“It’s simply become an expectation,” Fox says of winning at the top levels and players advancing to the next levels of the sport.
“Ultimately, coaches drive intensity in the sessions, but it can only be done if the players do so as well,” Fox adds. “Obviously being surrounded by a number of high mentality individuals helps, and I think the results have shown across all levels.”
Mureta will be joining a number of OSU alumna such as all-stars Maya Smith and Nibo Dlamini on the Gee-Gees, who are no stranger to high expectations.
The three-time defending OUA champions have been a perennial contender at the university level, boasting an OUA-best 12 titles after their 2024 championship run.
The team is led by uOttawa’s second longest serving head coach, and the founder of the women’s soccer varsity program Steve Johnson. Johnson has twice been named national coach of the year and eight times Ontario’s top coach while leading the Gee-Gees to an incredible 303-33-66 regular season record and playoff appearances in all 30 of his seasons at the helm.
OSU goalkeeper coach David Bellemare has also been a long-time assistant for the uOttawa women, who have won 23 conference medals in the past 30 years.
The Gee-Gees will look to continue their OUA dominance in 2025 with their season kicking off on Aug. 30 against the Trent Excalibur.
Fox knows that nothing is a given when players reach the next level of competition, and that balancing university studies and soccer is a large commitment, but he’s confident in Mureta’s ability to excel as an extremely talented player with a winning pedigree.
“A lot of players when they get to this age group and they get some university success, they relax a bit,” Fox cautions. “I think the challenge for her, and anyone else really, will be to almost double down again, work harder, because you’re going up to another level.”
Read More of our 2025 High School Best Series as we tip our caps to top local student-athletes at: OttawaSportsPages.ca/Ottawa-High-School-Best-2025