The Lion's Den

“Let The Feet Do The Talking”

By Peyton O’Neill, Staff Writer

September 20th, 2023

Holy Cow, School Lane made a high school soccer team! It is the first high school soccer team for us, and everyone is excited to play. For years, students have been begging the school to implement more competitive sports. This year, we’ve finally gotten our wish.

The soccer team is led by Coach Andy Meehan. Coach Meehan has high hopes for this year’s team and the new changes. “I'm excited to set the foundation of the soccer program and hope for it to continue to grow and eventually set an example for other sports to be offered here at School Lane,” he said.

The coach had tryouts for both the girls’ and boys’ teams on Monday August 28th, and Tuesday August 29th. The games started on the 6th of September for the boys. They will have practice 4 days out of the week, with a maximum of 20 players on the team. Their home field is called Fatima Field which is located on Street Road. The team this year will include star midfielders Ameer Barkat, Jayden Lewandowski, and Peyton O’Neill.

Tryouts were Monday, August 28th and Tuesday, August 29th. Monday’s tryouts started off with getting warmed up, and seeing what position players wanted to play. After finding out what position they wanted to play they got into two teams for a scrimmage match. Prospective players played a game to get to know how to play their position. Then Tuesday they did the same thing and played a scrimmage match again. All of this intense competition helped Coach Meehan choose the 20 students who would make the team, out of the 27 who tried out.

Caption: The team huddles before a match.

Photo credit: Grace Cao

Unfortunately, we planned for a girls’ team, however, it could not happen this year due to a few reasons. The coach tried to get a girls team, but there were not enough girls that showed up to tryout. There were about 10 players that showed up and they needed to be 20 for a full team. Coach Meehan hopes to start a girls’ team next year, but needs more interest for it to be successful.

For now, the boys’ team will lead the way in competitive soccer this year.

When asked, Coach Meehan said it can be hard to predict our chances this year. However, he feels hopeful, saying, “I feel good about our chances but there are a lot of unknowns that we can't predict until we actually play the games. The good thing is that we have an older team filled with Seniors and Juniors so I am confident that we would be able to adapt and meet the challenges of each game to have a successful season.”

Despite being a new team, players and coaches are happy about the shared goal of success and are ready to leave their mark on the field. Through dedication, hard work, and remarkable teamwork, they are determined to make their high school proud.