Team captains this year are seniors Reilly Cencer (midfield), Rachel Eisenrich (attack), Kinsley Hurt (midfield/attack) and Alli Zimmer (midfield). The girls are excited to welcome the new group of incoming players and are antsy to start the season in general. Bringing lots of energy to kick off the season, they shared how they have invested a lot of time off-season and hope it pays off.
“Most of the seniors have been together since middle school, so it’s an amazing opportunity to be seniors now. We used to look up to the senior leaders, and now we are the leaders, so we want to do a great job,” says Reilly Cencer.
Rachel Eisenrich agreed and added, “It will also feel rewarding when we finally get in the groove of things and start to click more as a team. Every season is gets more fun as it progresses, because people start to gain confidence and play better together.”
This season, the team hopes to score in the higher 500s in order to be either 8-5 or 7-6 rather than 6-7 like they were last year. In general, they would like to win more than they lose and they believe it is possible this year. Monticello is their toughest competitor, but the girls are working hard during practice and doing two practices a day this season. One practice will be dedicated to playing games, while the other will be for strengthening their skills through conditioning.
Coach Hugh Hovde says, “I really enjoying working with the kids in general, so this season will be an overall great experience. The players are motivated and we always have fun regardless of the score, because they do their best.”
This will be an interesting year for the team, because they have a large group of both seniors and freshmen. There are 10 seniors and 17 freshmen so they are strong on all sides and hope to maximize their talent by being more productive. For instance, this year, they want to be more intentional about how they organize practice, because they tend to lose their upper hand in the second half of games. It would be good if they could figure out how to keep their strength in both halves of games to finish with more wins.
Their first game of the season is April 16 against Monticello.
