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Barbie Thompson’s parents visited their alma mater in the summer before her sophomore year of college and had breakfast with the late W Association Hall of Famer Bob Nye, at the time the College’s men’s golf and men’s soccer coach. Two months later, Thompson was on her way to her parents’ old stomping grounds.
Hailing from Arizona, Thompson’s Wooster athletic career was almost derailed as soon as it started, as the midfielder suffered a preseason knee injury, and previously had a serious injury setback in high school that led to her attending community college for a year before transferring in. It was minor this time and by mid-September, Thompson’s stellar career was in full bloom.
Wooster’s still fledging program was coming off its first 10-win season in program history when Thompson arrived. Her impact was felt immediately as the Fighting Scots turned in back-to-back unbeaten records in North Coast Athletic Conference play. Sandwiched in between the two campaigns was the arrival of David “Geordie” Brown as head coach, and he brought the program to new heights.
“I was apprehensive of a new coach,” recollected Thompson. “But, Geordie was a great fit for the team and Wooster, and we could not have been luckier.”
Two years later, with Thompson as one of the senior leaders on the team, Wooster advanced to the first NCAA Div. III Championship in program history, where the Scots dropped a 1-0 heartbreaker to Mary Washington College. That year, Wooster boasted one of the stingiest defenses in the country as the Scots strung together a nine-match shutout streak, and held opponents to a 0.62 goals-per-game average.
Wooster’s rapid rise on the national scene didn’t go unnoticed by the National Soccer Coaches Association of America, with the organization voting Thompson second-team all-region. In fact, Thompson was one of three Scots voted to the all-region team in 1992, and Brown was voted by his peers as the region’s coach of the year.
A three-time first-team All-NCAC selection, Thompson went on to garner a spot on the conference’s all-decade team upon the 10th anniversary of the league. She played on teams that went 39-14-7 (.708) and won a pair of conference titles, also the first two in program history.
“Barbie had a great engine on her and would be involved in so many crunching tackles throughout the game,” said Brown. “She was the team leader with her communication, positive support, and high expectations of herself and her teammates. She played the game with a smile but hated to lose and drove her teammates on to perform at their highest level. Barbie was a major factor in the success of the teams in the early 1990s.”
After exhausting her eligibility on the soccer pitch, teammate Marcy Hunt asked Thompson to join the track and field team. Thompson promised she would if she was still in shape upon returning from winter break, and sure enough once January rolled around, Thompson laced it up.
“I told Dennis Rice I wasn’t as fast as mom, but he didn’t care and kept me anyways,” joked Thompson, whose mother, Lois ‘73, is a member of the W Association Hall of Fame, and was one of the founding members of the original women’s track and field team at the College.
Primarily a relay contributor, Thompson was a part of three all-conference relays as a senior, and helped the Scots to runner-up finishes at indoor and outdoor NCAC Championships.
Since graduating from the College with a bachelor’s in fine art, Thompson’s stayed heavily involved in soccer. She played for the Arizona Heatwave for two years, and currently assists her husband, Timothy, with the Arizona Arsenal Soccer Club.
Professionally, Thompson’s a ceramics teacher at Highland High School in Gilbert, Ariz., where she’s chaired the visual arts department for 13 years and has served as the visual arts co-coordinator for 12 years.
Thompson and her husband have two children – William (16) and Alice (14) – and happily call Gilbert home.