Our Valley Christian girls soccer team has had a great season so far, but unfortunately had a rough week the week of January 20^th. They played two solid region games against American Leadership Academy West Foothills and Northwest Christian.

They started off the week by playing ALA West Foothills on Tuesday the 21^st. This was a big game for the Trojans as they hoped to seal the win against the team that had beat them last year in the championship game of the ALA Ironwood tournament in penalty kicks. The girls came into the game with high expectations, anticipating their payback. Especially after the long drive, they were pumped up with excitement and had a new starting formation they hoped would work.

The girls started off the game strong with well-connected passes and good chemistry amongst the team. ALA is a powerful team, with powerful players and smart tactics. They took note of the Trojan formation and found ways around it. ALA scored their first goal against the Trojans within 15 minutes of the game, leaving our girls shook. 

The Warriors kept driving down the field, getting lucky on a couple of corner kicks. The Trojans were down 0-3 at halftime, feeling discouraged. The coaches gave them a good pep talk and some new strategies to take down their forwards. The second half of the game our girls did well keeping possession of the ball. Junior Sydney Paschich scored a beautiful goal off of a free kick with a couple minutes left in the game. Although the Trojans played well, they had fallen short, with an ending score of 1-6.

The second game was played at home against Northwest Christian on Thursday the 23^rd. This was a huge game for the girls because NWC is a big rivalry of Valley and the girls soccer team has never beaten them. Last season was the closest they got, taking the game into double overtime in the state playoffs. Our girls had hoped this would finally be the year, especially with all the encouragement they were getting from the people around them, stating they could beat them.

The match started off with high intensity from both teams. It was more of a defensive game for the girls, having to keep high vitality to get a goal. Halfway through the first half, Northwest drove down the field and caused a collision between a couple of girls, enabling the ball to roll in the goal. This was quite frustrating for our girls, but they stayed positive and made sure to work even harder. With the unfortunate event of a key player getting seriously injured, the Trojans were down another lucky goal, making the score 0-2 at halftime.   

The girls were determined to come back, but there were also lots of high emotions about how the Crusaders were playing. Valley prayed over their hurt player and produced a game plan on how to deal with the competition. Senior Layla Heller stated, "although we weren't very happy with how the game was going, I have never seen our team intensity so high, and teamwork be so well." With another player getting injured during the game and some strong criticisms coming from the other side, our girls carried themselves well. Despite the 0-3 loss, the Trojans did not let this game define their season; they are proud of the way they carried themselves and dealt with this loss, and so is the rest of the Valley community.