Sports
Expect Success for Lady Cougars Soccer
Chatham girls expect to make it to state sectional finals again in the coming season.
Second-year head coach Tracey Blanchard has big plans for the Lady Cougars soccer team. She and the team expect nothing short of the success the program tasted last season.
"I would love to make it (to the state sectional finals) again, if not do better," said Blanchard.
One aspect that works in the team's favor is that there are only two starters who graduated from the 2009 team that lost in the sectional finals to Bernards. So current captains Ellie Goepel and Catrina Yohay will be expected to lead the young team to back to the state playoffs with a vengeance.
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"We have a young but experienced team," said Blanchard. "We had a lot of young players playing last year. We have a great attitude after preseason."
In addition to the two departed seniors, there will be another difference between this team and the 2009 version. For the 2010 season, Chatham girls soccer has been moved from Group II to Group III, meaning they will be competing against bigger schools. The way it works is that the higher the group, the more students the school boasts.
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However, the group rankings only affect the state playoffs and have no bearing on the regular season schedule, so all the classic rivalry games will still take place.
"We are Group III now as opposed to Group II," said Blanchard, "which is going to be a big challenge because we're playing the bigger schools. Moving from Group II to Group III only deals with states."
Blanchard said the biggest conference rival for Chatham will be Morris Catholic.
Blanchard has built up her squad with a mentality that is prevalent with a lot of teams in a lot of different sports—defense.
"We're going to try to build from the defense forward," said Blanchard. "We're very big on having a very firm defensive back, and we are going to encourage our players to shoot as much as possible."
The Lady Cougars open their preseason schedule with a home scrimmage against Morris Hills High School on Sept. 2 at 4 p.m. The regular season begins at 10 a.m. on Sept. 11 with an away game against one of the toughest opponents all year, Kinnelon.
