The YRHS Raiders boys' soccer team triumphed over their Gladstone Avenue rivals the Sacred Heart Saints by a 5-1 score on Thursday at the Sacred Heart soccer field in SHSAA exhibition action.
However neither team put much stock into the final score considering the two teams will not face one another in the regular season, with Sacred playing in the SHSAA 'AA' division, while the Raiders take part in the 'AAA' conference.
Instead both head coaches, Sacred's Jeanne Fetsch as well as Raider coach Steven DeLong, focused more on how their teams looked in their first game of the season, with both coming away from the game with different opinions.
Raiders
"The positive thing for us is that we didn't lose a step," offered Raiders head coach DeLong following the match. "We looked the same as we did last year which is a good thing as we picked up right where we left off."
It is a good thing for the Raiders, seeing as they had a strong season last year, winning two of the three tournaments they attended while coming just one game short of qualifying for Provincials, losing to Prince Albert St. Mary 2-1 in the regional semi-final to end their season.
This year, however, DeLong hopes the team will take their season one step further. "Yeah we won a couple of tournaments last year so it's not like we struggled or anything," suggested DeLong. "We're just trying to push further this year. We want to make it to Provincials."
If the Raiders are to make it past the regional stage this year, they'll do so in large part because the leadership of a trio of senior players: Matt McKee, Curtis Gleason and Ryan Merkl. "You always look at your senior players, to grade 12's this year like McKee, Gleason and Merkl, who are guys you want to come in and are guys that can step up and play better than they did last year and kind of lead the team," mentioned DeLong, adding that another player, grade nine rookie Matthew Mandziuk will also be thrust into the pressure cooker that is SHSAA soccer. "Matthew (Mandziuk) has been captain of lots of his teams over the years so while he is only in grade nine he knows what it's like to be a leader.
"I'm still not going to put that kind of pressure on him but he plays like a grade 12 guy."
Two other players that DeLong expects will help lead the team are grade 12 veteran Haylen Langelier, as well as Brendon Weber, the latter being new to the team as a grade 12 player, but who DeLong belies possesses leadership qualities.
Action wise, the Raiders will travel to a tournament this upcoming weekend in Swift Current before co-hosting their home tournament with Sacred Heart on September 26 and 27.
They'll then take part in regionals from October 17-18, before hopefully playing in 'AAA' Provincials on October 24 and 25.
Saints
On the Sacred Heart side of things, Saints head coach Jeanne Fetsch felt her team showed some flashes of brilliance during the friendly match but were vulnerable in some areas of the game; something she credits to a combination of inexperience and a short bench. "We do have to improve a lot of things," offered Fetsch, continuing, "But I have some players that haven't played a lot of soccer so we have to start from scratch with some of them."
Luckily Fetsch has some veteran players at her disposal that can mentor the more inexperienced members of the club. Players such as Ben Fetsch, star defender Liam Poole, starting keeper Zack Shearer (currently injured) and Austin Jasan are four such players who the Saints head coach feels will help lead the team.
Fetsch also mentioned that, as Sacred Heart is a smaller school than its orange Yorkton counterpart, it's hard to field a full team when the athletes are also on other sports teams, such as volleyball and football; a problem that was evident during Thursday's friendly. "We have 15 players altogether but we only had 12 of them here tonight because I have three players playing in the football game right now," mentioned the Saints head coach. "I had a grade eight playing with us tonight because we were a little bit short benched for this game but that's what is happening in our school right now. Everyone is playing different sports."
Last season the Saints made it to the regional semi-final before bowing out to Moose Jaw Vanier 3-1.
Next weekend the Saints will be in Swift Current for a tournament before they co-host their home tournament with the YRHS.
Regionals will be held from October 17-18 while 'AA' Provincials, should they qualify, will be held in Warman on October 24 and 25.
