Teams to watch
1. Howard: The Hustlin’ Tigers played for a district title in their first full season in school history. Now they also sport a junior varsity program and will look to build on last year’s success.2. Dalton: It’s tough not to expect big things from Dalton, which has won a GHSA state title each of the past three seasons and hasn’t lost since the end of 2012. A couple of key players graduated, but don’t expect the Catamounts to miss a beat.3. McCallie: The Blue Tornado looks to get stronger as talented players like 2015 Best of Preps first team member Drew Viscomi call themselves upperclassmen. A state semifinalist last year, McCallie could take the next step.
Players to watch
1. Cameron Rigler, Hixson: The senior midfielder will look to provide leadership and consistency for the Wildcats, who are coming off a district title.2. Emerson Brock, McCallie: Brock is one of the players returning for McCallie making the transition to upperclassman status. Look for the talented goalkeeper to set a good tone defensively.3. Gustavo Mendola, Coahulla Creek: He cracked the Best of Preps third team as a sophomore last season, so there is plenty of time for the standout defender to continue improving and become an even bigger force.
The expected postseason success did not follow the Cleveland High School boys’ soccer team’s strong regular season in 2015, but coach John Brose said the Blue Raiders are poised to “finish the job” this year.
Cleveland was 12-5-1 and won the District 5-AAA title in the regular season, but East Hamilton delivered a stinging 3-2 loss in the district tournament final and the Blue Raiders exited the playoffs in the region semifinals.
“We had a good season, honestly,” Brose said. “We made it to the region tournament and lost to a good Cookeville team. That’s a goal of ours, is to challenge for that district championship again and move on from there and compete for a region title.
“We’ve got a lot of returning guys from that team, so I think it’s something that in the back of their minds. They know what happened and they’re willing to work as hard they can to get back to where we were and finish the job.”
Among those returning is captain Chris Pistrang, who believes the team will benefit from familiarity.
“Some of us have been playing together since basically fifth grade playing club, and now we’re here together at school, so you know what runs players are going to make and you know how they want to play,” Pistrang said. “There’s a great sense of unity, and there’s not a lot of egos on the field.”
Pistrang is one of 18 seniors in the program. Brose said he hasn’t ever had this many 12th-graders, and he appreciates the leadership and maturity they bring to the team, with the players focused and intentional in practice.
The goal is to do the little things right and build habits that will pay off in the long run.
“We put ourselves in a great position last year with a great regular season, but ultimately what was our demise was the attention to detail in the postseason,” Brose said. “We knew where we wanted to be but didn’t do the little things that were required of us to get there.”
This year, part of that preparation has been a tough preseason competition schedule that included strong local programs such as Baylor and Boyd-Buchanan, as well as Knoxville’s Farragut. Brose said seeing so many good teams early helps tighten up weaknesses.
The Blue Raiders also will have tough tests to start the season, including a rematch with Cookeville, as they host their annual tournament starting Thursday.
They expect it to be the beginning of another good year – this time with postseason success included.
“This year we made one of our main goals to win the district tournament, and on from there we just have to take it every game at a time,” Pistrang said.
“And we need to finish it off and keep going. There’s no reason why we shouldn’t.”
Contact Idris Garcia at sports@timesfreepress.com.