Girls’ soccer program enjoying competitive season

By Rebeca Rivera

The Lady Rattler’s soccer team has literally kicked into gear and is feeling very confident in what has become a breakout season for Lady Rattler soccer.

Girls’ soccer has never been a good discussion topic, and the student body was not interested in the sport - until now. For the first time since the soccer program began five seasons ago, the Lady Rattlers have begun to change their luck around by devoting themselves to the sport – getting into the win column more this season than all other seasons combined.

“As soon as you start winning you feel like the whole school is behind you,” McLain said “Teachers telling you congrats in the halls, random people coming up to you saying ‘Good job on y’all’s win’, and you don’t even know them. Having people say ‘Hey when is your next home game? I want to come watch y’all.’ really means a lot.”

Navasota won six of its first ten games this season including a third place finish in the New Caney invitational tournament in January.

“Before soccer was nothing, and nobody wanted to watch us lose,” sophomore Cailey McLain said, “but now I feel like this team has given the Lady Rattler soccer team a positive name.”

The first win, which made Rattler soccer history, was against Brookshire Royal. The Lady Falcons put up a good fight but with defense on the move that night, the Rattlers ended with a 4-2 win which marked the beginning of this very venomous soccer season.

The team’s biggest win came over the large and tough class 5A New Caney Eagles in New Caney’s home tournament. The Rattlers trailed the Eagles 2-0 at the half but exploded with four goals in the second half - one each by Crystal Marroquin and Araceli Murillo and two by Cailey McLain - to surprise New Caney and knock them out of championship contention.

“What inspires me to win is that last year we didn’t win any games, so this year I really wanted to win,” sophomore Erika Murillo said “Besides that, our coaches this year have done great things for our team.”

The Lady Rattlers are a young team but many of the girls have prior soccer experience which has helped in the team’s development. New coaches and a new attitude in practice have been important in the turn around as well.

“We are more athletic this year which always helps,” head coach Jennifer Briggs said. “We've had to instill discipline, a better work ethic, and gain everyone's trust in order to accomplish one goal at a time. It was pretty rough in the beginning but things are slowly falling into place.”

Briggs added that the girls are taking pride in the program and the hard work is paying off.

“I knew it would be tough,” Briggs said “You come into a losing program, and one of your biggest challenges is to convince these kids that, with some hard work and discipline, they can win a game--even though they haven't won a game in almost 4 years. It's been rewarding and challenging at times, but definitely well worth the effort.”

Sophomore Cailey McLain saves the ball from the Magnolia Bulldogs’ offense, at the Rattler’s Brule Field. photo by Scott Powers

First row - left to right: Isabel Montoya, Crystal Marroquin, Z’Aundria Warren, Jasmine Bautista, Veronica Barron,

Lourdes Paramo, Angelica Vela.

Second row - left to right: Ana Castro,

Araceli Murillo, Taylor Prewit, Sarah Jarvis, Lizzy Cobb,

Cailey McLain, Bree Petrich,Jessica Balvanera.

photo by Scott Powers