Kern Valley took to the pitch for six games over four days. This included opening the HDL schedule against Mammoth and Bishop.
They began play versus Mammoth. The Lady Broncs opened up their league season with an away match against the Lady Huskies. The two teams battled the whole way. The half would end in the scoreless tie. Coming out of the break, the two squads continued to run back and forth going from offense to defense. The score remained 0-0 as they approached the halfway mark of the second half. Kern Valley was able to get inside the Mammoth defense and break the scoreless tie. Kern Valley’s Kassandra Guarneros lined up to take the corner kick. The corner kick sailed into the net giving the Lady Broncs the 1-0 lead. With about 10 minutes left in the match, Mammoth was able to break free and scored the tying goal. Both teams clamped down and the score of the match ended at 1-1.
The following day, the Lady Broncs were back on the road as they were playing their second HDL match. This time Kern Valley would be facing rival Bishop on a key matchup. The Lady Broncs have not scored a goal against the Lady Broncos since 2017. They were hoping to end this scoring drought. This trend would end quickly as the Lady Broncs took the early 1-0 lead.
It took less than five minutes into the match for Kern Valley’s Alex Armes to find the back of the goal. The Lady Broncs would make it 2-0 as Aspen Hacker took the pass from Kenadie Young and banged it home past Bishop’s goalkeeper. In the second half, the Lady Broncos would answer twice and make it another tie game. Bishop kept the momentum going and would rally back to take the 3-2 lead. It would end that way giving the Lady Broncs an HDL loss.
After playing the two HDL matches it was tournament time for the Lady Broncs. Kern Valley would compete in the Mira Monte Tournament. They opened with a match versus South. Going up against the Lady Rebels who are a higher division team than Kern Valley. It was all South as they would come away with the 2-0 win. The Lady Broncs could not muster any offense as they fell in the initial tournament match.
Playing the waiting game, Kern Valley had a five hour wait before going up against Golden Valley. The defensive battle saw only one goal scored in the match. Unfortunately, it was for Golden Valley as the Lady Broncs lost the match 1-0. In their next match, Kern Valley was slated to play the No. 1 ranked team in Division 1. Stockdale loomed as the tournament was in day two. The Lady Broncs had to wake early and be ready to play at 8 a.m. Paul Armes the head coach of the Lady Broncs decided to rest his starters and let the younger players see the field. Once again, no offense as the younger players fell to Stockdale 5-0.
The sixth and final game of the week and the tournament found the Lady Broncs facing off with North. Thus was the team that Kern Valley was supposed to open the season against that got cancelled because of the high AQI in Bakersfield. Going into the match P. Armes urged his team by saying, “I bribed, pleaded, and begged for 60 more minutes out of the girls for our last game.” The Lady Broncs responded as they were able to pull off the 2-0 win. The defense really stepped up as they limited their opponent to just two shots on goal. Young would score the only goal that Kern Valley needed. A. Hacker added one more goal as that put the Lady Broncs up 2-0.
The tired, nearly exhausted, and sore Lady Broncs held their head high as they left the field knowing that despite the setbacks, they competed at a high level that can only bring future success. The Lady Broncs will know have an extended layoff for the holidays. They will be back in HDL action on Jan. 7 when they go on the road to Desert.
Busy week of matches for Lady Broncs soccer team
