The UC High Girls Soccer Team has hit their stride and are shooting to win this year’s championship by working together as a team and enhancing their skills.

  “Last year’s season was difficult at times, but as it went on, our team got better,” said Senior Maya Arriaga.  During the first round of Division One CIF playoffs against Del Norte last season, the UC team came back, after trailing 1-2 in the first half, and scored a goal in overtime to win the game. “We haven’t done that in years and years,” commented Senior Julia Cowell.

   “Since we are back in D2 and have lots of returning players, I predict that we will rank high in our division and go far into CIF playoffs like our previous years,” said Cowell.

  With a new year comes new changes, and some of them aren’t always helpful. Sophomore Sidney Gillum said, “We lost a lot of seniors last year, and two of our goalies from last year aren’t playing this year so we have had to adjust.” However, there are always benefits to having a younger team. Senior Allison Bush stated, “Having younger players on our team gives the team some diversity and more spunk, because there’s a lot of new energy coming from them.”

   “On the field, there is much more aggressive play than in practice,” commented Cowell.

  “Varsity is a whole new game. You have bigger and more aggressive girls,” stated Arriaga. She further explained that playing on varsity is more serious than playing on junior varsity. It’s more physically demanding, and it’s also a higher level of play.

  Sophomore Alexis Engebretson added, “Playing on varsity means that you’re playing with girls that are either at your skill level or, most likely, above it. It becomes an environment where you’re constantly building off each other and improving your skills everyday.”

  Sophomore Meredith Olney stated, “In soccer, there is a lot of running. You play 90-minute games where you are running back and forth a large field. Even though we have unlimited substitutions for high school season, you have to be able to play the whole game at 100 percent.”

   “We take pride in working as a team and respecting one another. It was a lot of fun spending time with my team on and off the field,” stated Cowell. Arriaga said, “I think we can work on always having the drive to win and working hard to get wins against teams that are better than us.”

Olney expressed, “I love soccer because it’s a team sport. The team that works and plays harder wins.”