Maliah Atkins, along with her Jamaican teammates, did something that no other Jamaican women's soccer team has done before: defeat Canada.

Atkin's team did just that with an emotional 3-1 win over Canada. With the win, Jamaica won Group E with seven points advancing to the knockout stage.

"It felt really good," Atkins said. "Before the match, they showed us the records from every single women's team that has played against Canada. It was a lot of 9-0, 4-0 shutouts and after we scored the first goal we felt the pressure to keep it going. Then we were like, 'okay we've got this' and once we kept on scoring we felt more and more confident about winning.

"Once that final whistle blew, we weren't really shocked, it was more of an amazing feeling. They told us once we made it back to the locker room that we were the first girls' team to beat Canada. It wasn't just another win for us, but we made our mark in the federation."

Atkins, a native of Roxborough, Colorado, has committed to play soccer for South Dakota and will be a freshman this coming fall. She has played for the U19 DA Real Colorado Soccer Club for the past two seasons. In the summer of 2017, Atkins club coach Lorne Donaldson connected her with the Jamaican Women's Soccer Federation.

"My club's director, who is actually my club coach now, got me connected with the Jamaican coaches and the Federation," Atkins said. "I competed with the U17 Jamaican team and competed in the CONCACAF tournament in the fall of 2017."

As for this year's tournament, Atkins was invited to the Jamaican team camp to compete for a roster spot.

"The camp was supposed to be held in Florida actually," Atkins said. "Then from there they would choose the team based on how well you did at the camp. With travel complications and time running out, the camp actually just turned into more of a trial for playing time rather than a spot on the team."

Once on the team, Atkins along with her teammates made the trip to the host country of the Dominican Republic where the remainder of the practices and matches were held. In Jamaica's first game of the 2020 CONCACAF, they tied with Guatemala 4-4 before picking up their first win in the group stage with a win over El Salvador, 4-1.

Outside of dealing with the heat, constant training sessions and matches, Atkins learned a lot from a different group of women and coaches from what she had learned growing up in Colorado.

The trip taught her how to look at things differently, react to a variety of outcomes and be able to adjust to anything.

"One of the main lessons I learned from them is to play with a different level of support and playing for each other," Atkins reflects. "They showed us how to play for each other and to have each other's back. In club ball we do have that family atmosphere but that's because we have been together for so long. The way they brought us together in such a short amount of time was amazing and I definitely learned a lot from my experience with them."

Once in the knockout stage, the Jamaican team faced Bermuda. They took care of business winning 9-1, knocking Bermuda out of the tournament and setting up a date with the host country the Dominican Republic.

After surrendering an early goal, the Jamaicans tied things up in the 37' at 1-1, but the host country would come away with the winning goal in the 74' to give them the 2-1 victory. The loss knocked out Jamaica out of the tournament.

Throughout the 19 days Atkins spent training with the team and playing against several different national teams, the one thing she took away was perseverance.

"Never give up," Atkins said. "In our first game of the group stage we were down 3-0 at half and came back to tie it up 4-4. That was one of the things that set the mood for us right away and we just stuck with it. You have stick with it even though you are tired and want to quit, you just have to never give up and keep pushing forward."

Never giving up and pushing forward is something Atkins will continue to strive for when she arrives on campus in Vermillion this fall.