The De Soto High School girls’ varsity soccer team received a “reality check” after losing 4-0 against Spring Hill High School on Monday, April 15.
Originally, the girls expected the game to be easier than it actually was, even though they had lost to Spring Hill earlier in the season. The team thought, however, that because that game was before spring break and the team was not united, this game would play out differently.
“We had made a lot of improvement throughout the season, and they had made those improvements as well,” assistant coach Melissa Stone said.
The reason for the loss could be due to a variety of things. Since Prom was the weekend before the game, there was a possibility that the girls were tired. However, Stone believes that this had minimal affect. Rather, she attributes some of the sluggishness to the fact that “a Monday game is always tough.”
“We really had a chance to win. We really had a chance to fight with them, but things just weren’t going our way that night,” Stone said.
Going into the game, the girls had specific things that they were going to try to focus on.
“The girls should have focused on having a winning attitude, going into the game thinking that they do have a chance to win and putting that effort and attitude onto the field in their play and not giving up,” Stone said. “That would have been huge for us.”
Spring Hill is ranked second in the state, and going into the game DHS was ranked third.
“We really had to step it up and play our A game …” Stone said. “…We were making silly mistakes, goals were being scored that we could have definitely stopped.”
Stone believes that Spring Hill is going to be the biggest competition in the league and that DHS will most likely face them again, either in a playoff, Sub-State or State game. Now, the team knows what they need to fix and so they will be better prepared for the next game.