The Lady Trojans may have stumbled a bit at the Mesquite Cup soccer tournament at Virgin Valley High School, where they went 1-2, but Trojans coach Pam Larmouth remains optimistic and sees more positives than negatives coming out of the two losses.
“The team is looking good. We saw some very good things at the tournament and are hopeful that we can get everyone working on the same page by the time we start playing conference games,” Larmouth said.
The girls played Foothill and lost 7-0, Moapa Valley and won 3-1, and Clark, losing 2-1.
Larmouth said her girls learned a lot about the team after losing to Foothill.
“We learned a lot about our new players and saw some outstanding effort,” she said. “It was a great experience playing Foothill. They have a core group of club players and played amazingly well together. We came together in the last half of that game and started playing a good passing game.”
In that game against Moapa, Sydney Dennis and Lacey Di Blasi scored goals with Yesenia Garcia and Vaniah Vitto assisting. Against Clark, the coach said she learned her team still needs work conditioning and she thought the teams were evenly matched.
One thing that can’t be turned into a positive is the injury to junior defensive center back, Cierra Friesz.
“Our game against Moapa was difficult in that our starting center back, Cierra Friesz, broke her ankle in the game,” Larmouth said. “So we did allow a goal that otherwise wouldn’t have happened. We will have to redesign our back lineup for a good part of the season and are scrambling to make that happen.”
Cierra Friesz’s mother, Carey Friesz, described what happened.
“She was trying to take the ball away and she fell and landed on her ankle the wrong way,” Carey Friesz said. “We thought it was a sprain, but the doctor said it was a fracture. We don’t know at this point how bad it is.”
The mother added that the doctor will determine how soon, or if, Cierra will return this season.
Larmouth said the three games in Mesquite gave her a good idea who will be starting in the next game.
“We have a good idea of who will be starting in all areas except for the back. With the injury we are trying out some different positions and will see after a couple of games,” Larmouth said.
The next game was supposed to be up in Spring Creek but the Trojans canceled the tournament and so their next game will be away against Sunrise Mountain on Sept. 8 at 3 p.m.