The Boys varsity soccer team, under the coaching of Coach Pendleton had a great run in the postseason last year. They plan to defend their title by practicing and working harder.

Last year the soccer team had a lot of seniors who were leaders,  but with less seniors, will they have the same team chemistry as last year?

Coach Pendleton said they have strong leaders with players that have played with him for four years.

Soccer is a sport which involves a lot of running and physical endurance. According to Livestrong.com, the average soccer player runs seven miles a game.The varsity  squad has been running and putting in extra work to stay in shape, so they will be able to compete even after running for a couple miles. Then they hit the pitch and have a full practice.

“We run a lot, but it’s good for us in the long run,” sophomore defenseman  Jordan Garrett said.”We do everything from sprints, to a couple mile runs.”

The team practices everyday after school to get better and improve to show that they are a dominate team in the EKL. This includes high pace drills, for example they do passing drills with movement so they keep their heart rate up to help conditioning. Players even run a lot after a normal practice. The team will also have one practice sometimes just dedicated to running, this includes long distance runs and sprints. Coach Pendleton has not changed much in practices.

The team lost some pretty good players but believe they have some new skills that they didn’t have last year. This includes more speed all around which was something they didn’t have last year. Speed kills and Coach Pendleton thinks they are faster this year than they were last year. But, they also have some weak links with losing those seniors.

“We have a bit more speed than we have had in previous years,” Coach Pendleton said.

Even though they have gained some speed they are a relatively young team and need to work on the fundamentals. This includes passing and footwork. Sam Gettings believes that there are about five to ten bad passes in a game that would equal opportunities but are misplayed or poor and inaccurate passes

“We need to improve our passes,” sophomore defenseman Nigel King said.”We need to start moving the ball around the field faster, we are working on that.”

The whole varsity team is itching to get into the postseason this year and even farther than they did last year. Right now the team is sitting at  (5-1-1). Southwest played Bishop Miege, one of the best in the district and held them to a 0-0 tie in double overtime. The players are very optimistic and believe they have lived up to the hype from last year.

“I feel  like we will come out on top,”said Garrett. “our guys are resilient and don’t go down without a fight.”

The team is looking ahead to the West matchup. Some players are saying it will be a physical test and compare the game to a battle.

“The West game,” Garrett said. “it gets very physical, but we love that so it’s going to be a battle.”

Coach Pendleton takes it on a game by game basis and works for that one game. He looks for deficiencies that can be improved through practice.

There are some weak links that need to be addressed and it’s not fundamentals. It’s experience and youth.

“We are young in certain areas,” Coach Pendleton said. “those kids just need to play more to gain some experience.”

There was another concern that hit some of the sophomores that played on the JV team last year. A coach that was funny and had a sense of humor left the team.

“We did lose Jobe who was a good coach.” King said.

Most coaches give a pregame pep talk and help players focus but when it comes to soccer there is a pregame mix they listen to.

“There is never a specific pep talk,” King said. “We always have a pregame mix.”

Some of the players believe they have fallen right in line to the path the Varsity paved last year and didn’t even lose a step.

“Right now we are. But we are barely into the season,” King said.

Another believes these first couple games have not just been a fluke or because they have played bad teams.

“I feel like this year we have lived up to last year,” sophomore forward Sam Gettings said.”We are a very solid team.”

The team doesn’t have a specific goal this year but some have a few in mind. There are weekly goals coach Pendleton has as well as personal goals players have.

“We have not established a particular goal in terms of winning a certain number of games etc,” Coach Pendleton said.” We are concentrating more on process than outcome.”

Sophomore Sam Gettings has another goal in mind when it comes to how he thinks the season is going to turn out.

“I BELIEVE THAT WE WILL WIN!!”Gettings said.