“We were considered to be the best team in the state, but we lost,” sophomore Gavin Jagunich said about the soccer team last season. The boys soccer tweam had came close to winning a section championship the past two years, but has lost to Woodbury both times. They had not been able to take that next step to the state tournament. However, this year they believed they had a good chance of going far in the playoffs , and maybe made it to state.
The last time the Ponies won a state championship was in 2016 ; They were state runner-ups in 2017. Sadly, they had not been to the state tournament in a long time.
“It’s been a real shame that we haven’t really been able to play in a state tournament yet… We just sadly haven’t been able to get it together towards the end of the season,” Podlucky said.
However, these past losses were not getting them down. Many players had high hopes for this season, and believed they could play in U.S. Bank Stadium. Gavin said he “thinks the team will do decent this year.”
“We’re improving as the season progresses,” JV player Logan Treder added.
“I think we have a really tight-knit… community going, and I really enjoy playing with all those guys… I think we have [excellent] chemistry as a… whole,” Hadden said.
On Sept. 21, the team played Minnetonka at home. Unfortunately, they lost 5-1, but many believed Minnetonka would be the hardest team they played this season.
“We played them the other day, and, I mean, they were extremely strong, and we knew they would be… A real challenge going into that,” Podlucky explained.
There had also been some coaching issues on the JV team. They did not have a coach for the first part of the JV season.
“We had a rough start [to the season] because of coaching… But we have our coach now and we’re doing better,” Logan explained.
Many of the players said that they believed the leadership on the team was solid this season, and would help lead the team to success. Hadden told us he liked the captains this year.
He said leadership was “really motivational.” He also said he enjoyed how they were all trying to reach a common goal.
This season is going well for the team. Their current record was 7 wins, 3 losses and 3 draws. They were currently ranked fifth in their conference, and still had many games to play before the postseason.
