Pahrump Trojans youth team wins league championship

A Pahrump Trojans girls soccer team recently won the championship of a recreation league in Henderson. The team is part of the Southern Nevada Soccer Association, Henderson United.

Co-coach Jodd Friesz said the league is more of a recreational league than a club league.

“What differentiates this league from a club team is the age bracket,” he said. “In this league we lumped girls coming out of eighth grade with juniors in high school and on club teams you don’t do that.”

The team is coached by Friesz, who assisted the high school’s varsity team last season, and Julie Carrington.

He said the girls trained and played hard.

“We trained three days a week to play an eight-game season,” Friesz said. “The girls conditioned and worked just as hard as if they were on the high school team.”

All the girls on the team are in high school. Seven of the players according to Friesz play varsity ball.

This is the second year in a row the team has won the title.

According to Friesz, the games were really physical games.

“The entire weekend was physical,” he said. “The girls coming out of AYSO learned that when you get older you need to use your entire body in this game.”

A key player was Yesenia Garcia, who scored the only goal in the championship game and also scored one during the penalty kicks. Garcia was third in goals scored for the high school team last year and will be a senior this year.

Paige Chaffee, who was second in goal scoring for the high school last year as a junior, helped win game three by scoring a goal. She was helped by freshman Donna Forcht. It’s not known if Forcht will be playing for the Trojans next season.

In the championship game, the game was tied so it went to penalty kicks. Winter Young did a great job of protecting the goal with two saves and this allowed Pahrump to win. Young will be a senior this year for the Trojans.