The Briar Woods Girls Soccer team had their final regular season game on Wednesday, May 8th with a loss against Independence High School, ending their four-game winning streak. However, they had quite an impressive overall season, ending with a 9-3-3 record and continuing on into the state tournament, June 3 versus Midlothian.
Assistant Coach Raven Short comments on this year’s season saying, “I think we had high expectations for this year, especially coming off of winning states. It put us in a weird mental space but yeah [the high expectations] definitely allowed us to set new goals and expectations for ourselves.”
The Varsity girls team started off their season with a 1-2 loss against Woodgrove, and Short mentions how they felt that their games early in the season were not their best, as the team was still figuring out who they were.
The team then went on to win three games against Parkview (11-0), Loudoun County (3-1), and Meridian (5-1), and tie against Broad run (1-1). On May 2nd they faced off against Rock Ridge for senior night, one of the most memorable games of the season. The team won the game with an astounding 8-0 in a dominant, energy filled night. Short felt the seniors were a big part of the team this year, stepping up as “capable leaders for the underclassmen.”
The team then went on to have two ties and five wins against various opponents, with their only loss being against Independence on April 22. The team faced off against Independence again for the district championships and unfortunately ended the regular season with a loss. However, the team took this loss with much grace, and were proud of their improvement. Their previous loss against Indy was 1-6, and they were able to improve to 2-8.
“Even though the result wasn’t what we wanted, we played well as a team and overcame a lot of mental hurdles,” Avery Maltese, a senior and a forward on the Varsity team mentions. “We play in a really competitive district and I think we did a great job of playing our best every game and putting ourselves in a good position for the postseason.”
The players look back on the season positively, coming out stronger and closer. Their chemistry was highlighted as one of their main strengths, with the whole team being very “close, cohesive, with no pockets of cliques,” as said by Coach Short.
“We are all very close as a team, a lot of us [have played with each other] for a long time, so we are very comfortable,”Alley Quigley, junior forward, comments. “We do a lot of team dinners and bonding activities!”
When asked about her experience with the team, Quigley mentions that ,“The regular season had a lot of ups and downs. But overall [we did] well for being a young team in a competitive district. I love every single girl on this team […] and I wouldn’t have asked for a better group of people to [play] with. We do a great job of uplifting each other and I’m excited to see how far we make it.”
