FAYETTEVILLE — Parker Goins and Taylor Malham had butterflies when they first took the field together.
Kindergartners from the Tulsa suburbs, Goins and Malham played on a recreational team called the Butterflies in the early 2000s. On just about every level imaginable, the two have been almost inseparable since.
“I still have the shirt with a big butterfly on it,” Malham said. “We’ve been best friends for a long time. It has been fun getting to grow with her and play soccer together.”
Now sophomores at Arkansas, Goins and Malham are the leading returning goal scorers from a 2017 team that finished 11-11-2 and played in the NCAA Tournament. Goins scored nine goals and Malham scored six as freshmen. They also combined for nine assists.
Through four games this season, Malham has one goal and one assist, and Goins has two assists. The Razorbacks are 2-1-1 entering Friday's 7 p.m. home matchup against Baylor, an NCAA quarterfinalist a year ago.
In their 15 years as teammates, they have played at Union High School and on the club team TSC Hurricane. Over the summer, they played with each other on the expansion amateur team Fortuna Tulsa, and spent time together at the U.S. Women’s National Team Under-19 training camp in San Diego.
“It’s so surreal because we always talked about it,” Goins said. “(Arkansas coach Colby Hale) called and said you guys are going together. It was one of the happiest moments.”
Both had played on national teams before. On the U-18 team in 2016, Goins had the assist on the game-winning goal against England. Earlier this year, Malham had the only goal during a U-19 match at Switzerland while Goins and other Arkansas teammates watched prior to a workout in Fayetteville.
“She scored and everyone was going crazy,” Goins said. “It was just fun being able to know my best friend was able to score at the international level.”
Despite being the same age and being called into Team USA settings more than a half-dozen times combined, Goins and Malham had never made a trip together before the training camp in May.
“Going together was very special for both of us,” Malham said. “We have played on every team together and it was a dream of ours to come to college together, and eventually play at the highest level together if possible.”
Hale said both were in the mix to play in the U-20 World Cup this summer and are both “right there” in terms of making national teams in the future. He said he has seen more maturity from Malham since she returned from Switzerland as a late call-up.
“When you’re playing against the best players in the world, you come back and you’re going to be a little more confident,” Hale said. “I think she always wanted those opportunities and I think she earned them. I think to get called in, it kind of confirmed in her to keep plugging, you’re doing the right stuff. I’ve seen a big difference in her as a sophomore.”
Goins and Malham compliment one another off the field as well as they complement one another on it.
“I would say Taylor has a great work ethic and she’s the most fit person I know,” Goins said. “She can run up and down the field and she never gets tired. She works hard for every ball. She’s a good finisher, so when she’s in front of the goal, I can count on her to finish it. And when she’s on the outside, I know to get in the box because I know she’s always going to put in a good ball.”
“She’s a really hard worker,” Malham said of Goins. “You know she’s going to get on the field and get her work done. … She’s dynamic and can do anything. She’s fast, she’s skilled, she’ll get back on defense. She’s just all over the place.”
Hale said Goins and Malham were destined to be great athletes. Both come from athletic families — Malham’s father, Jeff, played college basketball at Kansas State and Tulsa, and was offered by Nolan Richardson at Arkansas after setting the career scoring record at Broken Arrow High School near Tulsa; Goins’ father, Aaron, played two seasons of professional baseball for the Cincinnati Reds and spent a short time on the football team at Oklahoma.
The families are “super close,” Goins said, after years of traveling to soccer games. Their history includes three consecutive state championships in Oklahoma’s highest classification, part of a 51-1 run for Union in their final three seasons in high school. Arkansas sophomore Hayley VanFossen also was part of those Union teams.
Nayeli Perez, who played high school soccer at Union’s rival, Jenks, played club soccer with the Union girls, giving the Razorbacks four players from the same club team in the same signing class.
“It definitely helps,” Hale said of recruiting players with previous experience playing together. “They already know some tendencies. Parker and Malham, they look for each other. They just know what the other is doing. They have a chemistry because they have played together their whole lives. We don’t (recruit teammates) strategically, but in some cases it helps, for sure.”
It should help Arkansas for a few more years to come. Hale said Goins and Malham have become stronger, more athletic and more composed than they were during their stellar freshman campaigns.
“Anytime you’re a young person, you’re used to being the best player on the field in high school and club, then you come to college and there’s lots of players,” Hale said. “What maybe worked before … you have to figure out different ways to win one-on-one battles.
“They are going to have a breakout season for sure.”
A version of this story first appeared in Hawgs Illustrated