Sophomore Thomas Jones watched the ball go into the net as the men’s soccer team defeated Pisgah, 7-0,  for one of its seven conference wins of the season.

“We had a really good time that night because of our good team play,” Jones said.

The team recently finished the regular season 9-12-2 overall, 7-7 in the Western North Carolina Athletic Conference. The team qualified for the first round of the playoffs, losing to Statesville, 3-8.

“I’m already excited about next year,” Jones said.  “We are going to have the same line-up. This year has built a lot of chemistry for our team. It will make us better next season.”

The men’s soccer team worked hard to earn a spot in the playoffs, senior Daniel Molina said.

“I was excited to see how far we could go in playoffs,” Molina said. “I think we can get together and become more of a unit against better competition.”

With only eight seniors, the underclassmen had to step up to varsity level. Sophomore Trevor Laffin started every game this season.

“I enjoyed being on varsity as a sophomore,” Laffin said. “I’ve learned a lot about the better competition and speed of the game. It makes me play at a higher level.”

Although the team experienced some uncertainty after losing so many seniors from last year’s team, Molina believed that they overcame the challenge.

“Losing a lot of seniors made it difficult to get a grasp on what our identity would be,” he said. “Throughout the season we have become used to each other and realized who we are as a team.”

Head Coach Brian Brewer was confident in his team’s abilities and was proud of his underclassmen for stepping up.

“It’s been a learning process for sure,” Brewer said. “It took us 20 games to get us to .500. We started four sophomores, and they were skilled players. We will be set up nice for next year.”

By Will Lindsey