Warriors open season with 2 road matches
In 2021, the Gordon Central High School soccer team was two wins away from taking a GHSA 2A state championship.
This winter, with just about all the returning starters back from that amazing 20-win team that ran into a buzzsaw in Pace Academy in the state semifinals, the Warriors are hoping to looking to close that gap.
“Things are going well,” Gordon Central head boys soccer coach Matt Wiley said. “The players have looked good. We’ve got a lot of returning starters, so I’m having to replace just a couple of players. The kids, I think, are more fired up and ready for the season than I have been because they’ve come in in good condition and they’ve really, it seems, been ready to start this year since our season ended last year, so we’re excited to get it started.”
They did not hold any preseason scrimmages, instead playing a pair of road games this week to kick off the season as they visited Dawson Tuesday (details of that game were not available at press time) and then go to Christian Heritage in Dalton Thursday evening to wrap up a busy first week.
Wiley said he expects his players to be ripping and roaring right from the start.
“I want to see us play with that same tenacity that we played with in every game last year,” Wiley said of his expectations from the first week of the season. “We really played with an edge last year and I want us to continue to play that way this year. I want to see us executing. I want to see us scoring early and scoring often, if we can, and I want us to keep the pressure on the other team, the other goalie. We were very effective with that last year as far as keeping constant pressure on the other team and I want to see us continue being that way this year.”
The Warriors will definitely be one of the most experienced teams around, as Wiley enters this new year looking for one just defender and one midfielder because he knows who his other starters will be.
“We’re definitely looking forward to the season,” he said. “A lot of these boys have been together for a couple of years now and some of them for even longer than that. But they know how I like to play and how I coach and I know them and what they like to do and what they can do and so we’re very much looking forward to getting started.
“We had a great time last year. We made a deep playoff run until we ran into an incredibly talented private school team that ended it for us. But we’ve scheduled some top competition this year to help us prepare for what we hope will be another deep playoff run. We’re fortunate that there are a lot of good soccer programs in Northwest Georgia, so we don’t have to go far to find good soccer programs that will help make us better players and therefore, a better team.”
Senior midfielders Brian Rico and Charlie Garcia, senior wings Richard
Barrios and sophomore Nehemiah Morales, senior striker Zeke Prada, goalie Armando Sanchez, along with senior defenders Alan Garcia and Javin Blake are among the returning starters and Wiley says they have looked the part.
“All of those guys have looked good,” he said. “They all look ready and for those guys, the season never really stops. They all are constantly training and working on their conditioning and playing club ball, so this is a year-round thing for them. They don’t just go season-to-season and they’ve come in ready to play.
“Our conditioning is very important. We play a fast, physical style of soccer and we try to wear the other team down. We try to just constantly keep the pressure on and guys know we ask a lot of them at both ends, so they stay in good
condition. I think it played a key role in the great season we had last year and I’m fortunate that the kids know that and so they work hard to stay in top shape.”
Charlie Garcia, who is a captain, and Prada were the team’s two leading scorers last year.
“Those guys gave us a nice 1-2 punch,” Wiley said. “They’re both very skilled offensive players and very determined when scoring opportunities arise, so I think they’re both looking forward to having a big year with both of them being seniors.
“And Charlie’s an outstanding captain. He’s an incredible leader both on and off the field. One of the best I’ve ever been around. He has been with the varsity team from the very start, since he was a freshman, so he knows what’s going on out there. So we feel like we’re going to get some shots on goal and we’ve got kids who can finish.”
The Warriors were the undefeated 2A Region 7 champs last year, going
11-0-1 in Region play and outscoring the six teams they played by a combined 49-10 count in those 12 matches, For the year, they notched 88 goals and surrendered just 16 scores, or an average of less than one a game, in 2021.
“We played excellent defense last year and Armando’s an outstanding goalie,” Wiley said. “We know we have to play good defense to have the type of team we want, so we stress keeping the pressure on the other team’s attack.”
They won three playoff games last April before their season came to an end in the state semifinals. They began their postseason journey with a one-sided 10-0 victory over Therrell and then shut out Temple, 4-0, to advance to the quarterfinals.
Thomasville was able to score twice against them, but the Warriors beat them, 5-2, in the quarterfinals before losing in the state semis to Pace Academy.
The Warriors were 201-1 last year.