Colleyville Heritage’s girls soccer program is two years removed from playing for the Class 5A state championship.
It may seem like it’s longer than that. But coach Misail Tsapos knows that the 2013 season has been a rebuilding season. The Lady Panthers haven’t had too much to get excited about as the District 6-5A season nears the halfway point.Colleyville Heritage (2-7-5, 1-2-2) has struggled to score and played several freshmen and sophomores.Remember, this program lost 11 seniors off that state finalist squad. That can make an impact for a couple of years, despite last year’s playoff appearance. At this point, it’s really debatable whether this team will make the postseason.“The last two years have been a rebuilding situation,” Tsapos said. “We have one freshman starting and another playing 50 percent of the time. We have four sophomores starting and two seniors. The rest of our roster is juniors, so we have a young and inexperienced team. We’re a little soccer-naïve.”What Tsapos means is that this team is struggling with his offensive system, which requires a lot of movement and puts players in a position where they can be creative. It’s taken a little bit of time, and there have been some rough spells.Tsapos has never developed a system where one player is featured, scoring 30-40 goals. He wants to create a balance between his midfielders and his forwards.In Colleyville Heritage’s first 14 games, the team failed to score in 10 of them. All five of the ties were 0-0, and five of the seven losses were 1-0. That’s tough to take when a team is so close but can’t find a way to score.“We’ve worked really hard,” Tsapos said. “The girls’ effort has been great. It’s just been frustrating for everybody. But I think we’re finally starting to get there. We’re in the fire. We just have to see if we can continue to deal with this.”The Lady Panthers may have started to figure some things out. They scored a season-high three goals in a 3-1 victory over Irving Nimitz last Friday. Freshman outside midfielder Shane Pickler, junior midfielder Logan Brant and sophomore Taylor Hanzy all scored. Those three will be expected to handle much of the scoring load.“It’s kind of a case like in basketball where you have to cheat to get a rebound, but we have to do it with where we are on the field,” Tsapos said. “Right now, we’re a step behind. We still have a ways to get there.”Colleyville Heritage played at Carrollton R.L. Turner Tuesday and is home to Hurst L.D. Bell Friday to close the first half.Grapevine updateThe Lady Mustangs are revealing that they will be the favorites to repeat as District 6-5A champions. They were 5-0 as the week began with games Tuesday at Irving MacArthur and Friday against Irving Nimitz. They were 13-0-1 in district play last year as they advanced to the Class 5A Region I area round.Through the first district games, they’ve punished their opponents as they have outscored them, 18-2. No game has been close. Grapevine won the first meeting with rival Colleyville Heritage, 3-0.Have more to add? News tip? Tell us
