The Kern Valley girls’ soccer squad is ready to begin its season on the pitch.
The Lady Broncs have had recent success and the hope is that this season will surpass last year. Paul Armes still holds the reins on the Lady Broncs as he enters his eighth year of coaching at Kern Valley. He will get assistance from James Meachem who also played soccer at Kern Valley. This year’s team has 22 athletes. Within that, the Lady Broncs will return eight seniors to the team. They join the other six underclassmen returners for a total of 14 coming back to the Kern Valley squad.
Returning seniors include, Elizabeth Allen, Alexander Armes, Danika D’Amico, Kassandra Guarneros, Aspen Hacker, Christine Laveck, Isabelle Mosqueda, and Morgan Young. Coming back as juniors to the Lady Broncs are, Ella Mauer, and Isabelle Valdez. Returning sophomores are Payton Forbes, Kyla Hacker, Tearah Moore, and Scarlett Weber. Newcomers to the team are juniors, Emily Blankenship and Greta Boettcher. Sophomore, Harley Jolly join freshmen, Anna Allen, Gabby Eastes, Faith Kirby, Riley Wilkins, and Kenadie Young.
Coach Armes has a goal that sees improvement in his team. He wants the Lady Broncs to rise above last year’s success and do better. He said, “We got third in league behind Mammoth and Bishop and made semis in CIF, so anything better than that would be great.” His plan to get there will be molding new players to attack and work on giving them a chance to help out the offense. His reply when asked how he will attain this goal said, “We got a couple key new players for our attack and we’ve been working on utilizing them in our training.”
With the non-league portion of the schedule mixed in with a few HDL matches, coach Armes will have to make sure all of his players are on the same page. With 14 returners, an easy transition in getting his players to come together and be successful in a quick, efficient way. He said, “We have North as our only non-league match. Our second and third games are Bishop and Mammoth, so it will be an interesting start. After that we are entered in the Mira Monte tournament.”
The HDL will another attempt at unseating powerhouses Mammoth and Bishop. Teams that Kern Valley has had trouble with in coming out on top. The early league measure will give the Lady Broncs a chance at starting quickly from the gate. Coach Armes said, “Mammoth and Bishop the only two we have not beat.”
With plenty of experience coming back this season, the coach sees the strength of his team in the fact that these players have come up together playing soccer and they can turn that into positive results on the field. Coach Armes said, “We are very solid in all spots this year, it’s very exciting. All the starters have been playing a long time and it’s fun to watch them play together.” The flip side is the areas that need work. The coach needs the new players to learn quickly and give the returners the boost needed to become even more the powerful team he desires. Coach Armes said, “Our bench has a lot of freshman and sophomores, so we’ll need to get them dialed in for the next couple years when these seniors leave.”
As the new year approaches coach Armes hopes to be able to lead these players to not only be successful on the field, but also in life. In his closing thoughts he said, “I’m very excited and sad at the same time. I’ve been coaching these girls since they were four, five and six years old, so many games and memories. I hope we kick butt.”
This could be the year that the Lady Broncs soccer team gets back to being in the top echelon of the league and then in the CIF playoffs. Only time and the matches they play this season will tell whether that will come to fruition. This Thursday the Lady Broncs will go on the road to face off with North. This will be the first step in kicking off the season on the right foot. The match is schedule to start at 3 p.m.
Lady Broncs soccer team hoping to improve on recent success
