Slow start to boys soccer, physical makeup to qualify for state

This spring the Boys’ Soccer team will look improve off of a disappointing end to last season, falling 1-0 in the district final to Kearney. This year, the Eagles return nearly all of their major contributors from last season. “By the end of the year, we were starting five freshman, and four juniors and sophomores” head coach Peter Pham said. 

“We got some young competitors, I do not think they know how good they can be yet” Pham said. He hopes that he can help develop some of the players, but knows, “If everything was based on potential, every team would be #1 in the state” Pham said. He continued by saying, “They just have to work hard, (the) last week and a half we have had over 50 kids for conditioning and you just have to work hard in the offseason.”  

Central stared off 0-2 last year, but then rattled of 6 wins in a row. After that the Eagles would drop 4 of their next five games, before snapping a four game winning streak in the loss at Kearney to close the year at 11-7. The Eagles scored 34 goals last season, good for 1.89 goals per match. They gave up 26 goals, that is good for 1.44 goals per match. Current junior Victor Hugo Cruz Perez led the team in scoring with 7 goals. The top 4 goals scores from last year are all returning for the Eagles. None of them will be seniors this year, and two are current sophomores. The same could be said for the 4 players who put the most shots on goal, except three are current sophomores. This certainly will be a very young team. 

Pham said, “soccer is kind of a feel game sometimes, where you just have to play, you have to get to know the other players, we have a year of that under our belt, a half season last semester, and hopefully we can kind of improve on what we did last semester.” He continued by saying, “I think we have the physical makeup to make it to state, but there is also a mental aspect to it. We still have a lot of young kids playing, and that just takes a little time to get to that point. I think we have a chance to be a pretty good team if we put everything in place” Pham said.