Scoring Will Be Key For Hawks—

Girls’ Soccer, Solid Defensively, Shooting To Win It All

By Andy Hutchison

Newtown High School’s girls’ soccer team is coming off a season in which it lost just three regular season games. The Nighthawks, however, also won only seven since the team played to five ties. If the Nighthawks can find a way to turn some of those deadlocks into wins in 2011, they will earn better postseason seedings and, potentially, go deeper into conference and state tournaments.

“You need to win — period. Ties don’t help because everybody else is tying,” Newtown Coach Marc Kenney points out.

Newtown, which tied state tourney qualifiers Southington and nonqualifier Mercy with the most ties in Class LL play last autumn, earned the tournament’s No. 15 seed and fell 1-0 to No. 18 Hall 1-0 in the first round. Seeded seventh in the South-West Conference Tournament, the team lost 2-1 to No. 2 Pomperaug of Southbury in the quarterfinals.

The Nighthawks want no part of early postseason exits in 2011. In fact — never mind getting a round or two deeper this time around — they’re shooting for the top.

“We would like to win everything,” senior captain Maddy Keane said. “You do the best you can and we’ll see how it goes.”

“Just get a little bit better every day and I think the results will take care of themselves — as long as, every day in practice, the team tries to get a little bit better,” Kenney added.

The Nighthawks will have to overcome the loss of nine graduates, but the five returning starters and rest of the team members are off to a good start in preseason, the coach and players believe.

Keane’s defensive partner/captain in crime, Hannah Maret, pointed out that, since the start of preseason practice this fall, there has been a high level of energy on the part of this hungry-for-success Nighthawks team. “We could feel it day one — the energy was just contagious,” Maret said.

“I think the strength is clearly what the captains have done in getting this team ready,” Kenney added. “Everyone works hard. Everyone’s ready to be here — everyone’s committed to be here for the entire year whereas, in the past, I thought we started out like a ball of fire and when we started getting some results that aren’t favorable it starts to tail off a little bit. … Intensity is at a much higher level.”

Tactically, defense is the strength of this squad, Kenney believes. Keane is a two-time All South-West Conference and one-time all state honoree. Other key back-liners are senior Cassie Fallon and sophomore Anna Northrop.

“The challenge is to get off to a good start and score goals,” the coach said.

Junior forward Brittany Tolla is injured and will be sidelined for the year, Kenney said, and the team will have to find scoring productivity from players who step up this fall, he added. “If that happens we’re going to be very good,” Kenney said.

Junior midfielder Amy Martin, a two-time All-SWC honorable mention selection, anchors the midfield. Also at midfield are juniors Bridget Power and Tressa Scott. Junior goalkeeper Caitie Yakush, who played about half of the time last fall, takes over the starting role on a fulltime basis this fall, Kenney said.

Masuk of Monroe and Joel Barlow of Redding, as always, are tough rivals the Nighthawks will face this fall. The Nighthawks began the season Tuesday at Pomperaug and, sure enough, started the season with what else? ... a tie, 1-1. The team was slated to host Kolbe Cathedral of Bridgeport on Thursday (after The Bee went to press). Newtown will host Holy Cross on Friday, September 16, at Blue & Gold Stadium at 6 pm.