Winning creates a sense of safety heading into the playoffs.  And the Lady Knights Soccer team has had its fair share over the years.       

     The team has been through more ups and downs this season than they have in any other season. Not only has the team had to adapt to losing key players from the 2020 class but have had to make changes due to injury.

     The Lady Knights lost two starters, seniors Morgan Sigut and Anna Durmis, in the early stages of the season. Senior goalkeeper Elizabeth Waszkiewicz explains how the team had to adapt to these cruel losses.  

     “We had a lot of girls step up this year. In practices and in games they showed they were willing to work hard and eventually earn varsity time,” said Waszkiewicz. “Without two key starters, it was frustrating at first. But I’ve had faith in the younger girls so with the starters out, I knew they were going to step up and fill in the missing spots and do their job.”

     After multiple wins without some crucial players, the Lady Knights confidence began to rise once again. The confidence boost the team has earned was especially important to have heading into the second Fox Chapel game of the season. Earlier in the season, Fox Chapel beat the Lady Knights 1-0 in double overtime. This second game was the girls chance to use their boost of confidence to beat Fox Chapel. Senior Katelyn Kauffman explains the importance of winning this game.

     “We knew that going into the game we were going to have to play really hard. Fox Chapel is a good team but so are we,” said Kauffman. “It was important to play hard the first half in order to try to tire Fox Chapel out.”

     The strong mentality the girls created going into the game paid off for the good. With 13 minutes left in the game Kauffman scored the first and only goal of the night to win the game for the Knights. This important win boosted the girls confidence more than ever. 

      “The win was extremely important because our season didn’t start as planned,” said Kauffman. “We knew that this win was key; we had to make a name for ourselves again and prove that we are still a great team.”

     After the key win against Fox Chapel, the Lady Knights went on and continued to win. Among those wins, was a win against rival Penn Trafford on Oct. 20 to close out the season. The girls won this game 4-0 with goals from Kennedy Soliday, Paloma Swankler, Jenna McGuinness, and Halle Holtzman. 

     “In my time with the soccer team we have yet to shut out Penn Trafford,” said Waszkiewicz. “Defensively, that win is huge. Offensively it was big too. Scoring four goals is a great team takeaway. We have a lot of confidence heading into the playoffs.”

     With playoffs on the horizon, the girls are seated second in the section behind Fox Chapel with a record of 9-2-1. Although they are behind Fox Chapel the team is still heading into the playoffs with high confidence of a great outcome and a long playoff run. 

     “I believe we can make it back to the WPIAL final and even farther than that,” said Waszkiewicz. “When this team works together and plays as a team, there is no one who can beat us.” 

     The team has no worries looking ahead to the playoffs and hopefully even further into state playoffs. The Lady Knights plan to play their best game against any competitor in the future. The end goal is to win and make the remainder of the season a long one.

     “We are going to play our game, as easy as it might sound that’s all we need to do to be successful for the rest of the season,” said Waszkiewicz. “Play our, keep our composure, stay confident, and we will win.”