After a 2023 season filled with offensive struggles, the Streetsboro Rockets girls’ soccer team has no intention of letting history repeat itself. After a lackluster first half, the Rockets unleashed an offensive flurry against Portage County rival Crestwood to win their season opener, 6-2, last Friday evening at Jack Lambert Stadium in Mantua.
“You always want to get off on the right foot,” Streetsboro Coach Ryan Willard said. “We did not do that early last year. We laid an egg in our first game against an opponent we felt we should have beaten but I think it just gives us confidence because we did not win a game during our scrimmages.”
Friday’s game marked the first time that the Portage County rivals played against each other since the 2019 season. According to Red Devils’ Coach Eric Sway, Crestwood was ready to prove that they could compete with Streetsboro despite it being a bigger program.
Although Streetsboro (1-0-0, 0-0-0) led 2-1 at the end of the first half, the team was far from satisfied. The Rockets’ vaunted defense was holding its own, limiting Crestwood to only two shots on goal, but had squandered many scoring opportunities, having recorded eight shots on the net.
According to senior forward Lydia Shofield, it was an all-too familiar feeling not being able to capitalize on scoring opportunities.
“We had a halftime talk about it,” she noted. “We definitely needed to step it up in the second half and we did that.”
The Rockets continued pressuring Crestwood’s (0-1-0, 0-0-0) defensive third and sophomore forward Olivia Willard, who broke through when she slotted a ball in the right corner of the goal off an assist from senior midfielder Madz Genovese inside the 46th minute of regulation, extending Streetsboro’s advantage to 3-1.
Streetsboro did not slow down and added a pair of goals in a span of three minutes, with a goal scored by Genovese inside the 48th minute of play, followed by sophomore midfielder Jenna Fall collecting a rebound off a blocked shot attempt by Genovese to bury another goal, propelling the Rockets to a 5-1 lead.
Sway said that those three minutes was all it took for the Rockets to assume full control.
“That was the end of the game,” the third-year coach said. “By the time we got it situated again, the game was 5-1 and it was beyond repair.”
The Rockets continued dominating by maintaining possession for almost the entire the second half, surrendering only two more shots on goal and fueled by a dominant defensive half.
After last season which saw Streetsboro rely heavily on its defense to shoulder the load, Willard said his squad is hoping to have a more balanced attack this year, having returned most of their offensive leaders from last year’s squad, including Shofield and Olivia.
“We graduated a first-team all-defensive player and our goalkeeper,” the 17th-year coach noted “I figure it is going to take a little adjustment for us to develop in the back a little more and we return our top five scorers this year.”
Having set the school record with 12 shutouts last season, Streetsboro is sprinkling in a few new faces on defense including sophomore goalkeeper Morgan Novak and sophomore defender Carmen Marcini.
“We are going to have some growing pains at times,” said Willard of the Rockets’ defense. “We saw some really good things on Friday night which was really great.”
Coach Willard acknowledged that Streetsboro has not firmly settled on a primary goalkeeper and plans to have three players share time in the net at the start of the season before they determine which one will get the bulk of playing time to replace former Rockets’ goalkeeper Lainey Klein.
Having returned 9 of 11 starters from last year, the Rockets seek to finally capture a district championship after finishing as district runners-up in three of the last four seasons.
“I think the expectations are still pretty high,” Schofield said. “That is good because high expectations are probably better for us to help make us put in a little more hard work and stay at how good we were last year and carry it into this year.
Although the Red Devil girls’ program has come a long way in the short time since Sway took over, he acknowledged that the season-opener showed the Red Devils still have some hurdles to clear.
Following a road contest against Metro Athletic Conference rival Akron Springfield on Tuesday night and a home opener against West Branch on Thursday evening, Streetsboro will host Portage County rival Kent Roosevelt at Rockets Stadium’s Quinn Field on Saturday afternoon at 7 p.m.
Meanwhile, Crestwood will face Portage County rival Garfield at JAG Stadium in Garrettsville on Saturday morning at 11 a.m.
