The boys soccer team hit the ground running — literally.The first week, known as the conditioning week, was tough: the boys were not able to touch the ball the first week of practice. After a grueling first week, the boys headed into their first match, ready to go physically.

This year’s team is young but very experienced and working toward building team chemistry.

“I think this year has been tough not because of the players on our team but because of the natural disasters that have unfortu- nately stopped the team from competing for a good half of our season so far,” said team captain senior EthanTyng.“I’m excited for the rest of our season and playoffs because I think we have a really strong group of guys and a good chance of going all the way to the CIF nals.”

Another challenge for the soccer team was that a few of the football players who had made it to the CIF nals had very little practice time before the rst game.

After nally practicing as a full team only once, the Owls went into their rst game of the season the next day against Santa Clara, the team that had eliminated the Owls 3-1 in the CIF semi nals last year.

The game was fast-paced and back-and-forth; unfortunately, the Owls could not hold their 5-1 lead and tied Santa Clara 5-5.

“Santa Clara was really just an eye opener and revealed what we had to work on and what adjustments we needed to make. You never really know what to expect from the first game of the season,” said senior Javier Abrego.

Then, on Laguna’s home field, the team matched up against Rio Mesa High School, and could not get the ball in the net despite taking many shots on goal, losing 4-0.

After more practices together as a team, the boys’ normally high-powered offense finally took shape to clinch an 8-4 win over Villanova.The Owls dominated the eld in both time of possession and shots on goal. Tyng had an outstanding game, scoring seven goals, while senior Alex Furukawa capped off the game with the eighth.

“Villanova was good practice for our younger guys. Against a team like that, the game plan is usually play our starters for the beginning, get a few goals and then sub in our young guys. A win like that is good because it gives the less experienced players a confidence boost that in the end brings the whole team up,” said Abrego.