Glendale Community College Women’s Soccer Preview: Vaqueros hope to move up in new division
It’s been tough stretch for quite some time for the Glendale Community College women’s soccer team.
The Vaqueros suffered a rash of injuries last season en route to finishing 1-13-5, 0-10-4 for last place in the competitive Western State Conference South Division.
With the conference expanding to three division, Glendale will look to rise in the conference’s new Central Division.
“There are a lot of teams that have been in the South and North divisions over the last number of years,” said Glendale Coach Jorge Mena, whose team will start its season at 7 p.m. Tuesday with a nonconference home match against Cerro Coso at Sartoris Field. “So, they decided to break it up into three divisions and try to balance it out some more.
“It’s a good move for our team. You see some new teams, but you know there will always be one or two powerhouses in each division. So, we’ll look to try to make a climb and see where we can go.”
Joining Glendale in the Central Division will be L.A. Pierce, L.A. Valley, Santa Monica and West L.A. Valley, West L.A. and Santa Monica competed in the South Division last season.
Glendale, which has missed the postseason for 12 straights years, will take part in nine nonconference contests to get prepared for division action. Glendale will start division play at 4 p.m. Oct. 11 at Valley.
“We’ll have a team of between 15-20 players and that should be a good amount of games to see where we are heading into the division,” said Mena, a former South Division Coach of the Year selection. “It’s all about continuing to develop and gain more experience.
“I’ve seen improvement in their games every few practices since we began July 18. Their conditioning is a lot better and we’ll try to stay away from injuries. We’ve had so many the last few years and it’s tough. We’d like to shoot for above .500. There’s always hope going into a new season.”
The projected starting goalkeeper will be freshman Ana Hernandez. The defenders will likely be sophomores Vanessa Aldama and Paula Cabrera and freshmen Karla Castellanos and Jacqueline Rosas.
The midfielders are sophomores Alexa Acosta, Blanca Estrada, Miluska Huayta, Grace Ramirez and Elizabeth Segoviano (Hoover High). Acosta and Huayta will also see time at forward.
“We’ll find out a lot about ourselves early on,” Mena said. “It will take a couple of weeks to make determinations and trying to keep heading in the right direction.”
The Vaqueros will look to get comfortable on the road. They will play eight of their first 10 matches away from Glendale.
Glendale’s first division home match will be at 5 p.m. Oct. 14 against Pierce, which shared the North Division championship last season with Moorpark. It will end the regular season at 5 p.m. Nov. 11 at home against Santa Monica.
