Lady Wildcats hope to play well into November

LEE – With nine seniors on this year’s Lady Wildcats soccer team, head coach Lauren Finnegan has set a goal for her team to not only play together on both ends of the field but to be able to play into November with a Division 3 tournament berth.

“I have enough seniors among the forwards, mid-fielders, and defenders to be leaders in all three areas of the field,” said the second-year coach. “They have set some goals this year both offensively and defensively with our ultimate goal being that we want to be playing in November.”

Like the boys, the Lady Wildcats will have experience in the middle of that back line in Hadley Cook as well as senior goalie Sara Middleton who will become the full-time keeper as she replaces Cameryn Biasin, who transferred to the Berkshire School.

“[Cook’s] experience and her leadership is going to play a key role in our defense, because I will be playing both freshmen and sophomores back there with her,” Finnegan said.

Senior co-captains Moriah McKenna and Sammy Brown will anchor the mid-field, and had some success last year working together, while fellow co-captain Victoria Murphy will be asked to burden the scoring load as the team’s leading attacker.

On the wings, Finnegan will be utilizing some size and plans to stack the box in order to create scoring opportunities.

“We have some taller forwards in the box this year,” Finnegan said. “When we are at the end of the game and we need a goal, we will try to send the ball in and see if we can get a head on it.”

Offensively, Finnegan plans to use multiple sets, either a 4-5-1, 4-4-2, or 4-3-3, depending on the level of opponent.

“I have been working with different formations with them if we play against a [Division 1] school, we might play in a different formation with five in the middle,” Finnegan said.

As a Division 3 school in Berkshire County, Finnegan struggled to stay above .500 in her first year, after several years coaching the JV team.

“It was a whole different world [than the JV team],” Finnegan said.

This year appears to be different for the Lady Wildcats, as the team beat Mohawk in the pre-season 3-0, and tied a very good Smith Academy, 2-2.

“The girls are taking the ball and running with it – excuse the pun,” Finnegan said. “They are motivated, they are excited and because I have so many seniors they are a positive welcoming group of older girls, [to the younger players].”

Finnegan had a healthy 38 girls tryout for this year’s high school teams, and has witnessed the upper class mentor and embrace the newly arrived 7th-grade girls to the soccer program.

A certain step in the right direction for Finnegan’s program in the coming years.

“The 7th-grade girls have really felt at home and it’s huge,” Finnegan said. “When you have 18-year-olds and 12-year-olds together, it can be tough but the older girls are being great role models.”

The goal however, is to play competitive soccer with the rest of the county and earn a tournament berth in November.

“That is our big mission for the year,” Finnegan said.

Posted by Tim Davis on August 30, 2012. Filed under High School Sports,Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry