Kansas University's Emily Cressy, center, celebrates her goal with teammates in the Jayhawks' home game against Alabama-Birmingham on Friday. Cressy leads the Jayhawks in scoring.

During her darkest days last year, Emily Cressy wondered if she had made a mistake.

Maybe she shouldn’t have committed to play for Kansas University, she thought. Maybe the soccer sensation from sunny California with the golden left foot should have found a way to remain on the West Coast. She’d always dreamed of playing for UCLA, after all.

Instead, Cressy – one of the top club soccer players in the country out of high school – felt stuck. The 18-year-old freshman couldn’t play or travel with the Jayhawks. Grade issues had forced her to take a red-shirt season.

Road games were the worst.

“It was kind of hard because I couldn’t bond with my team,” Cressy said. “When everyone was gone, I was always alone in my room doing nothing.”

Cressy spent most days homesick, even flying back to California to be with her family on weekends when the team traveled.

Worst of all, she couldn’t interact with her teammates or listen to their stories about those road-trip exploits. Emily Cressy is deaf.

Early years

Cressy was born with a severe hearing disability but learned to speak over the years with the use of hearing aids. She wore two in each ear during high school and could still hear slightly until her sophomore year. Then one day, complete silence enveloped her right ear.

“I just started going deaf from there,” Cressy said.

She struggled for months to cope with what seemed like a cruel and inexplicable fate.

“Yeah, I was crying for awhile,” Cressy said. “It was hard to deal with, but God has a plan for me. That’s what my grandma always tells me.”

Cressy found comfort on the soccer field, where her heady play and pinpoint accuracy as a forward made her stand out for a different reason.

She was named the top player at the U.S. 17-under soccer national championships. She also starred on the U.S. women’s deaf national team. And during her senior year at Buena High School, she scored 16 goals and added 11 assists, leading her team to a league title and briefly capturing a No. 1 national ranking.

KU coach Mark Francis watched a few of Cressy’s club team games in Los Angeles and was sold.

“Emily’s a different kind of forward than some of the other ones we’ve had,” Francis said. “She has a little bit more finesse.”

Kansas felt like a perfect fit for Cressy, too. She liked the players and coaches on her official visit. At the time, it held another perk over a place like UCLA.

“That school was just too close to home,” she said.

Transition period

The acclimation period at KU took time for everybody, according to teammate Lauren Jackson, Cressy’s roommate last year.

“I tried to learn sign language,” Jackson said. “It was hard. But when we first moved in together we all tried to adjust to her.”

Jackson said communicating became easier during the second semester of last season, particularly when Cressy traveled with the team to Brazil to play four games in May. Teammates finally learned how to interact with Cressy, both on and off the field.

Francis said he had to develop his own method of coaching Cressy – who uses a sign language interpreter in class and at practice.

“The biggest thing is probably, a lot of times you’ll yell something at someone when they’re on the field, and you can’t do that with Emily,” Francis said. “You have to yell at someone else and tell them to tell her. Like if she’s out of position or didn’t step to the ball. And teammates are really good about it.”

Said Jackson: “You have to make sure you’re looking at her so she can read your lips. It’s like a team effort.”

Better days

The dark days are gone now. Cressy only sees her parents on her Web camera these days. She proudly admits she hasn’t been home one time since arriving on campus this school year.

Cressy said her biggest concern was how she would fit in with her teammates this season.

The answer lies in her play on the field.

Through the first four games of her Kansas career, Cressy leads the team in scoring. She has tallied nine points (four goals and one assist). And that’s not including her two goals in the team’s exhibition victory against Drake University. To put her totals in perspective, last year’s leading point-getter for the Jayhawks finished with 13 points – for the team’s entire 21-game season.

For her efforts so far, Cressy already has been named to both the Soccer Buzz and TopDrawerSoccer.com teams of the week.

Cressy has started every contest this season. Even the road games. And she’ll look to continue her hot scoring start tonight when the undefeated and No. 18 Jayhawks travel to Missouri State.

Cressy said last year made her a stronger person. But it really can’t compare to this year.

“It’s like 100 percent better,” she said smiling. “It’s a lot better.”