Sixty-five girls from Pleasant Grove High School tried out for the soccer team from August 3-6. The final Varsity/Junior Varsity roster consisted of the best 35 players, including a record-high 13 Freshmen, featuring all eight members of Team Spirit who tried out.First-year coach Lexi McMurdie had to cut several upperclassmen to make room for the formidable freshmen and caused no small stir in doing so. Coach McMurdie is obviously committed to developing a high-caliber program and is looking to shore up the future of Pleasant Grove girls soccer.
She better hope her plan works: the last four state championship matches in 5A (the classification for Utah's largest high schools) featured some combination of Alta, Brighton, or Lone Peak High Schools squaring off each other for the title of Utah's Best Girls Soccer Team. Thanks to the new state high school athletic region realignment, all three of those schools are in Region 4 which happens to be Pleasant Grove High School's region. That's the bad news and the good news.
The bad news is that theoretically PGHS could be the 4th best team in the state and never make it to the state tournament if it finds itself behind Alta, Brighton, and Lone Peak in the Region 4 standings! Only the top three teams from each region get to go to the state high school tournament.
The good news is that PGHS gets to play the best teams in the state twice every season during region play. Hopefully, when this year's freshmen are juniors and seniors they will have some valuable experience competing against the top Utah high school girls soccer programs.
Competition got underway August 13th with Junior Varsity and Varsity home tilts against the Provo High School Bulldogs in a preseason match. The PGHS Junior Varsity got the contests of to a bang when Madison Giles slipped a pass through the legs of a Provo defender to a streaking Taylor Kirk for the game's first goal. The JV Vikings didn't stop there, however, and when the smoke had cleared, PGHS has notched a 5-0 victory against an overwhelmed Provo team. The Varsity team followed suit with a 4-0 victory.
Two days later, the JV team improved on their performance against first-year Westlake High School. Five different players scored for the Vikings as they led the WHS Thunder 7-0 at the midway point. PG added two more goals in a deliberately pass-oriented second half for a final result of 9-0. The Varsity team captured a victory of their own 4-0.
Both of the Vikings' opponents probably made the team look better than they are, but having two victories and two shutouts provides a good confidence boost going into the last two preseason games of the season. On Tuesday, PGHS hosts the Stallions from Stansbury High School and on Thursday the Vikings take to the road for the first time to face the West Jordan Jaguars.
Tune it to get all the latest info on the team's drive to compete in the state's toughest region!
3 comments:
I think I will just wait for the commentary after the game, it's good stuff. Well, now that I think about it, the commentary is awesome but to see Maddie in action would be pretty sweet.
Wow, sounds like a touch league, but considering PGHS's commentary by G-Dawg, I'm sure those freshmen girls will come through. Keep us posted.
AWESOME! Go Maddie! Thanks, Geret for letting us know. And in such a cool way. Have you ever thought that you were in the wrong profession? JK
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