EL’s Johnson, Bethea ink soccer commitments to Piedmont, ABAC

With two of its four seniors already spoken for by college athletics programs, the East Laurens girls soccer team signed off both remaining members of its class of 2024 last month, when two more made their decisions official to make moves to the next level following graduation. 

Striker Madison Johnson signed with Piedmont University on Monday, April 8, and defender Anna Bethea with Abraham Baldwin Agricultural College April 25. 

The two, joining teammates Madison Cheek (a Columbia College softball signee) and Serenity Sparger (also pledged to ABAC), round out what’s believed to be the largest single signing class in recent East Laurens girls soccer history. 

“I think this is the first time I’ve ever had three in one year,” Lady Falcons head coach Chris Robinson said. 

Though they play on opposite ends of the field, both are arguably the team’s most impactful players from a class that wraps up its career having won three region titles in four seasons, and compiled an overall record of 62-15. This past season, East Laurens was only twice beaten en route to its latest region championship and the state quarterfinals. 

Johnson featured as the program’s most prolific scorer in years, with 90 goals that will rank her third all-time behind Hannah Theriault and Julia Watson. 

“She’s always been up top,” Robinson said. “In soccer, I find the hardest thing to do is score a soccer goal. To have somebody who can put the ball in the back of the net makes the game easier to coach, and you take it for granted sometimes when you don’t have somebody that can put it in the goal.” 

Bethea, on the flipside, was the team’s most prolific defender. She anchored a back group that gave up only 14 goals with play, and vocal leadership, that earned her nods as the team’s most valuable player and region 2-High A’s defensive player of the year. 

“She can see the whole field, and she knows what they need to be doing up top,” said East Laurens assistant coach Kristy Versprille. “You hear the comments in the back. She’s ‘Coach Anna’ as well. But you want a player like that. There’s the leadership. She knows what she’s talking about. 

“The position that she is in, she (plays it) very well. She knows if it gets past her, the next spot’s the goal.” 

Johnson, in her senior season alone, scored more than 40 times. But she was also as consistent a distributor as she was an offensive weapon, with more than 16 assists on the campaign and a whopping five in a region match against Dublin. Her career assist total of 29 will go down as the program’s second-best all-time. 

“She’s not selfish, she’s giving it to other people at the same time,” Robo said, adding that Johnson consistently takes extra steps in practice and on her own to improve her game, and boost the team as a whole. “I appreciate her work ethic. I think that’ll carry over to the college level.” 

The longtime multi-sport athlete lettered all four high school seasons in soccer and softball, having dabbled in a bit of basketball and cheer earlier on. Playing college soccer was not a longtime aspiration, but an opportunity too good to pass up when several arose for her to stay part of a game she loves. 

“I didn’t really decide until the end of my junior year,” Johnson said. “I saw that it was coming to a close, and I realized that I didn’t want to give that up yet, and I was ready to play another four years.” 

Piedmont, a parochial school based in the North Georgia foothill village of Demorest, competes in the NCAA’s Division III and Collegiate Conference of the South. 

The Lions were one of several college programs in the running to secure Johnson’s services, and all the good options made for a tough choice. 

“It’s been kind of difficult,” her mom Katie said. “She had a bunch of opportunities, and we were just trying to decide which one was best for her, looking at the academic and the athletic side of it.” 

“It was a really tough decision,” Johnson said. “I drew it out a lot longer than I wanted to. In the end, Piedmont felt like home. I felt at peace with the coaches and the girls that I’ve met, and the atmosphere up there. It just felt right.” 

Bethea, who held down the critical position of sweeper for her senior year, was a broom that helped keep the defensive end of the field mighty clean for the Lady Falcons. 

“She’s not the tallest, she’s not the biggest of size, but her heart, she plays hard,” Robinson said. 

The four-year starter has been a fixture somewhere on the back end since her ninth grade season, when she turned some heads by earning a starting spot that she’d never let go. 

Defense has been her only home on the field since picking up the sport at a very early age, and balking at the suggestion she become a goalkeeper for fear of getting knocked over by bigger kids charging the net. She opted for a spot a little further out on the defensive end, which proved to be the perfect fit. 

“I started defense at such a young age, and that’s the position that I’ve played my whole life,” Bethea said. “I’ve loved it.” 

Coming into her senior season, she was on the fence about giving college soccer a shot, versus hanging things up after her senior season was done. Bethea chose to pursue an opportunity at the urging of her father, Doug Bethea, who submitted that there was no harm in giving it a shot.

“I really never had it in my mind that I wanted to go play. My dad was like, if you get the opportunity, I think you need to go. Just go try it, and see how you like it. If you don’t like it, then you can come back home,” she said. “So I prayed about it, prayed about it, and this door opened up. And I was like, I guess I might as well just take it.” 

ABAC, a junior college out of Tifton, competes in the NJCAA’s Georgia Collegiate Athletic Association. 

“I’m very excited about her going to the next level, to see her compete in that level and see what all she’s got. As a dad, I’m thrilled,” Doug said. “It’s very fulfilling to see her at this point.” 

Bethea plans on a major of study that will ultimately lead to a career in the veterinary field. 

“I’m excited for her to see what the next chapter’s going to be,” said her mother, Dawn. “And I know she’s going to do great.”