DENVER – When former MSU Denver women's soccer coach Adrienne Pietz was back home and went to watch her cousin play a game over Thanksgiving a few years ago, little did she know that she was about to establish a pipeline that stretches from California to Colorado.
 
Pietz hails from Bakersfield, Calif.
 
Her cousin is a goalkeeper named Erica Torres (Bakersfield, Calif./Bakersfield).
 
And Torres' teammate was Reigna Banks (Bakersfield, Calif./Bakersfield).
 
"She went to watch Erica play, and then she ended up seeing me," Banks said. "Then she ended up building a relationship with our club coach, and that's how it all started."
 
MSU Denver has been reaping the benefits ever since, as its players from Bakersfield have been wreaking havoc.
 
Seven of the 26 players on the Metropolitan State University of Denver roster are from the same club program in Bakersfield.
 
Listening to the starting lineups and hometowns during pre-game introductions, it's enough to make a spectator look around and confirm that the program is MSU Denver and not MSU Bakersfield.
 
"I can't take credit for establishing the bridge, but I hope to keep it going," second-year MSU Denver coach Tracy Chao said.
 
In 2015, Banks and Raegan Staib (Bakersfield, Calif./Bakersfield Christian) joined the Roadrunners' program. Banks has become one of the program's top goal scorers, with 33 for her career. Staib has been a solid four-year contributor. Both are wrapping up their senior years.
 
Their final regular-season weekend is coming up, as the Roadrunners travel to Regis for a 1 p.m. game Thursday and to Black Hills State for a 1:30 p.m. game on Saturday.
 
The Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference tournament is the following week. Beyond that, MSU Denver is hopeful of reaching the NCAA Division II tournament for the first time since 2014.
 
As always, backing from Bakersfield will be required.
 
After Banks and Staib, the next recruiting class included Torres, the goalkeeper. Her father and the mother of Pietz are siblings. Pietz was a captain on MSU Denver's 2004 NCAA Division II national championship team.
 
"When I was growing up, she was already in high school and then was off to college – so I never really knew her," Torres said. "It was a hello on holidays kind of thing. So I never really had a relationship with her until my junior or senior year of high school. Then we really started talking, and she said she needed a goalkeeper."
 
It didn't take much to convince her cousin.
 
"She offered me a spot, and I think I decided within 20 minutes – which is fast for me," Torres said.  "I never visited the campus, never looked at the stats. She said it felt like family to her, so if she was fine with it, then I was, too. I put trust and confidence in her and it paid off."
 
Then the trickle became a river the following year, as defenders Jordan Lewis (Bakersfield, Calif./Frontier) and Mariah Rex (Bakersfield, Calif./Highland) and midfielder Mackayla Duerksen (Bakersfield, Calif./Liberty) came aboard.
 
"I came for a visit and met Tracy, and she really sold me on it," Lewis said. "And I practiced with the girls and they were all super welcoming. But it definitely helped that there were six others (from Bakersfield) on the team."
 
This year, midfielder Luna Garcia (Bakersfield, Calif./East Bakersfield) has been added to the mix.
 
Ironcially, there's a Division I program in Bakersfield – Cal State Bakersfield – that is nicknamed the Roadrunners. And Pietz played two years for those Roadrunners before joining these Roadrunners. Now Pietz is back at Cal State Bakersfield as a volunteer assistant coach.
 
Anyway, all the Bakersfield natives on the MSU Denver roster played club soccer for the South Valley Thunder under coach Jason Carter, who both Chao and her players praise.
 
"Jason has become a friend of mine," Chao said. "He's a coach who understands what it takes to play at the collegiate level. When you find a coach who knows what kind of program you have, the person and coach you are, the kinds of players you are looking for, and understands the level -- we might not be Division I but certainly the type of program we're running … I'm not training this team any differently than if I were somewhere else.
 
"I think he really gets that and knows he has players who can play Division I and in other programs, but he really looks out for what is best for that player."
 
Said Banks: "He's an amazing coach. He's really great."
 
Torres said Carter's mindset helped her transition to collegiate soccer.
 
"Jason is a very intense guy," she said. "So his attitude and his mentality and standards helped me prepare."
 
Lewis said that the number of South Valley Thunder players in the program provides plenty of evidence.
 
"I definitely felt that, skillwise, I was prepared," she said. "But of course you're never going to be prepared for the speed of play in college. But he did a good job – there's so many of us here, you know he did a good job."
 
There are some inside jokes and references, many of them to Carter, the players said, but Bakersfield has blended into a team that – at 9-5-1 – has already surpassed its win total for each of the previous three seasons.
 
So their teammates may never understand how good the Basque food at Wool Growers restaurant is, or sweet taste of the desserts at Smith's Bakery or the ice cream at Dewar's. But on the field, and off it, too, this is all about MSU Denver.
 
"Some of us hang out a little more than others, but it's not 'Bakersfield-only, sorry,'" Torres said. "We're very integrated."