Women's soccer star Jill Shimkin of Rockville Centre rises to the top

By CLARE GEHLICH

Intern

Rockville Centre seems to be a hot-bed for grooming future soccer stars. More than a decade since soccer superstar Crystal Dunn led the Lady Cyclones to three New York State Championships, another young RVC soccer star is making big waves.

Jill Shimkin is an up-and-coming young midfielder whose performance on the field has earned her numerous accolades and awards.

Earlier this year she was selected as one of 23 collegiate soccer players to earn a spot on the US Under-23 Women’s Youth National Team roster.

Shimkin, 20, grew up in Rockville Centre, where she attended South Side High School for four years, however, she never had the “full experience” of playing high school soccer because her season lasted for 10 months, while a typical high school soccer season lasts for four months. Before that, she started out in the intramural program with her father, Peter, as her coach.

Members of her family are considered local legends at South Side High School. Her father was a Hall of Fame wrestler, and her brother, Nick, was one of the top ranked competitors for wins.

Despite not having a real soccer experience during high school, Shimkin was in and out of national team camps throughout the academic year.

“I made a lot of my lifelong friends at South Side, which, again, I’m so grateful for, “ Shimkin said. “But I never got the full experience to be able to play high school soccer, which had its ups and downs, like pros and cons, for sure. But I wouldn’t try to, like, change anything about my past that I’ve taken.”

Her skill and dedication to the sport would help open up opportunities to play for local clubs in her teenage years, when she joined the Albertson Fury and the New York Soccer Club.

Shimkin has been an active member of the US Women’s Youth National Team since she first made the Under-14 squad and has had opportunities to compete in matches around the world, including events in France, Germany, China, Belgium, Sweden, Portugal and the Netherlands.

She is also a three-time New York State Cup Champion, a National Futsal Champion and a World Futsal Champion.

In 2021, she was ranked as the No. 7 overall player, according to the Top Drawer Soccer Top 150 national player rankings.

Competing with the women’s national team opened up many new doors for Shimkin, who started her collegiate soccer career with the Penn State Nittany Lions, before transferring to the University of Texas in Fall 2022.

“I think it made me learn a lot as a player, and just as a person, about myself,” Shimkin said about playing with the US Youth National team. “I didn’t really know the caliber of everyone else around the country. So it was cool to be able to play with people that are super competitive and have the same mindset as me.”

Her career with the Longhorns got off to a quick start. During the season-opener last August, she earned three points with a goal and an assist over Lipscomb.

Now, as she heads into her junior year of college, Shimkin has set a very high bar, finishing the season as the fourth ranked leader in assists and points, and seventh ranked leader in goals overall in the NCAA Big 12 Conference.

She also started all 22 matches and played a total of 1,812 minutes in the season.

Shimkin said that this coming Fall, her younger sister, Chloe, who currently plays soccer at IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida, will be joining the women’s soccer team at the University of Texas.

After she graduates from the University of Texas in 2025, Shimkin has dreams of playing at the professional level, having witnessed so many talented women who have helped pave the way for the next generation of professional women soccer players, including Dunn, who currently plays for the Portland Thorns FC and will be will be representing the US Women’s National Team at the FIFA World Cup in Australia and New Zealand next month.

Back in March, Shimkin and her teammates with the US Under-23 Women’s Youth National Team played against Dunn and the Portland Thorns FC during a pre-season tournament.

After only a few days of training, the Thorns, who started eleven players made up of mostly reserves, defeated the US team.

“It was a real cool, full circle moment for me to be able to play against someone who I’ve looked up to forever and to have played at the same club with her,” Shimkin said about playing against Dunn. “And also just to kind of be against her was a really cool moment.”

She also has aspirations to someday coach the sport, and is currently working toward her licensing as a soccer coach, which she said is “definitely a passion” of hers.

“I would love to coach at the college level or even professional level, just see where it kind of takes me. But that’s my plan as of now, who knows what will happen,” Shimkin said. “I plan on finishing all four years at Texas and then we will see where my journey continues to take me as a soccer player.”