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MANCHESTER TOWNSHIP – Graduating a senior class that won 53 games over a four-year span is never an easy thing to do.
Such was the case for Manchester girls soccer last season, who have plenty of new faces on the varsity level in 2018.
After scoring only two goals over their first four games, the Hawks put up eight goals against Lakewood. A combination of the new personnel and different formations contributed to the sudden turnaround.
“We made some adjustments with our formation and when we made those changes, it took us some time to get the girls acclimated to playing that style of soccer,” said head coach Wes Moore, who is in his seventh year running the program. “Since then, it’s been a little bit of a work in progress, but each game, results aside, they are getting better. It’s a combination of putting together the new formation and we have a lot of new faces after graduating 13 seniors last year, so it’s a big turnover this year.”
Manchester does return a trio of seniors this season in Taylor Hickey, Gabriela Batiato and Kayleigh Sharry.
“They are all four-year kids for us and have totally embraced the turnover,” Moore said. “The past four years with the senior class that graduated last year, they won 16 games, 13 games, 12 games and 12 games. These girls saw what it took and they’ve been there. Those three are huge for us right now in terms of leadership, stability and understanding what it takes to be competitive as well as showing the younger kids how to get better.”
Moore also noted the team has a decent freshman class and a very strong sophomore class this season, so the near future could be very bright for the program.
“It’s kind of baptism by fire for some of the girls,” Moore said. “We are looking for kids who are coachable and who will buy into our program and we are excited about our youth.”
One of those sophomores is Rachel Morris, who is the team’s leading scorer and had a four-goal game against Lakewood.
“Rachel is a very strong player,” Moore said. “Her soccer IQ is super high. Her work rate is there. We thought this would be a big year for her because she actually set the single-season record for assists last year, being able to set up A'liah Moore, who was our all-time leading scorer and is playing at Monmouth this year. Now she is not second or third fiddle, she’s the one and she’s embraced it. Only being a sophomore, I think she is going to have a nice future here.”.jpg)
The team utilizes a duo of junior goalkeepers in Carley Polchak and Claire Said.
“It’s a good problem to have in girls soccer to have two goalkeepers that are pretty well-versed,” Moore said. “The competition between the two is pretty good and they are both playing pretty well, but I think Carley will start to take the lead a bit more in the net as she recovers from an injury. She had a very good sophomore year, so once everything starts to re-click for her, she will probably be our primary goalkeeper.”
Manchester competes in B South with Pinelands, Point Boro, Lacey, Jackson Liberty, Barnegat, Lakewood, and Donovan Catholic.
“It’s always a war in B South,” Moore said. “This division kind of gets looked down at on the girls soccer side sometimes, but year in and year out the B South teams end up doing fairly well in the state tournament. It’s a lot different this year with only playing your division once. Everyone knows each other and there’s a battle for respect while battling to give respect. That’s what we joke about as coaches because we’ve had some very good teams over the years in this division. Lacey has been strong the past couple of years. We’re fighting for respect, but it’s a fun conference to be in.”
After winning their first B South division title in school history and hosting their first-ever home Shore Conference Tournament game a season ago, there were a lot of firsts for Manchester as the winningest senior class in school history graduated. Now, Moore is hoping the young players can pave their own way and follow in their footsteps in a few years.
“We are surprised and pleased with the youth that we have,” Moore said. “Scores aside, they are just buying in. I think if they continue to buy in, you might have some fun stuff come October into November in South Jersey, Group 2.”
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