Season preview

We are 4 days away from our first game and after watching us on Saturday in a make-up Blue/White scrimmage, I think we are ready. In the five years that we have been coaching, I firmly believe that this is the most complete team we have had. We have a team that is primarily made up of Juniors and Seniors who have played a lot of games together in their careers. We lost a great group of kids from our 2008 season, but when I look around at this years group, we seem to have been able to replace our losses. We return 7 starters and 4 players who played a lot of minutes last year as well. That is a strong nucleus to build around for sure.

Defensively we return both goalkeepers from last year in Senior Tony Lantz and Junior Logan Miller. We also return our sweeper backs in Seniors Zach Forbes and Gavin Schaefer. At 6'4 each, Zach and Gavin are both great in the air and are imposing figures anchoring the defense. Junior Connor Winking and Senior Josh Shannon both saw a lot of playing time at defense last year and will fill in nicely as regulars this year. Sophomore Dalton Stark has made the transition to wing fullback and his left foot is a tremendous asset on the left side.

At Midfield, we lost two young men who started for us as Sophomores and will be tough to replace. That being said, we feel that Senior Taylor Nord and Junior Ethan Venvertloh will be more than capable in filling the shoes of the departed. Ethan saw a lot of time as a reserve last year at both forward and Midfield and Taylor has started for us since he was a Sophomore as a forward, but has made the move to midfield and looks like he has played there forever.

Up front, we return 3 young men who were starters for us last year and have shown a great ability to work together. Senior Matt Burrus makes the move from Midfield to forward and his creativity and ball control make us an offensive threat every time he touches the ball. Senior Blake Williams gives us a physical presence that few defenders can match. Blake is big and strong and will score goals doing the dirty work. Junior Mitchell Schrage is the speedster of the group and creates a lot of havoc up top with his speed.

One asset that has been a staple for QHS soccer has been our depth. We have prided ourselves on developing players so that when we lose players to graduation, we have new players that can step in and not miss a beat. In the past, many of these kids were Sophomores, but this years version is Juniors and Seniors. There are only 3 Sophomores on the varsity at this time and the rest are upperclassmen. While the kids mentioned above may be starters for our first game on Friday, there is no guarantee that they will have that position on Saturday. Every year there is always one or two kids who surprise you and become a contributor when maybe you weren't counting on that. This years group is no different. I think we will be tinkering with a lot of different things early on to see who can help us become a better team.

This team has all the potential to make it to the state finals in Naperville. I hope we are playing in November and that I am freezing my tail off.