For most girls’ soccer teams, a 14-0 record, a 54-10 goal differential, a No. 1 seed in every upcoming postseason tournament and various state and national rankings would qualify as the best season in program history.
But Allentown High School is not competing with everybody else. The Redbirds, like they have been all year, are competing against themselves.
Even after Allentown beat two recent opponents, Hamilton High School West on Oct. 15 and Ewing High School on Oct. 17, by a combined score of 16-1, coach Kim Maurer said the Redbirds still aren’t quite there yet.
Maurer wants them to reach the level they achieved during their NJSIAA Group 3 tournament championship run in 2017.
“There is still work that needs to be done. It’s never perfect, but it’s also not where it was last year,” Maurer said. “We laugh about it. We’re 13-0 but still not playing our best soccer. We are working hard, playing well, but we’re just not where we need to be yet.”
Maurer is not crazy. She understands that being 14-0 is a nice accomplishment.
“Undefeated means we’ve overcome every obstacle we’ve faced, which says a lot about our team,” Maurer said.
Allentown is certainly a well-balanced team.
Eighteen players have scored goals in 2018, led by Emma Pascarella, Lauren Coiante and Alex Searing, who have nine, seven and seven goals, respectively. Pascarella (14) and Searing (six) have also combined for 20 assists.
A team with so many options will be hard to stop throughout the playoffs. Allentown opened the Mercer County tournament with a 1-0 victory over Princeton High School on Oct. 20. It played fourth-seeded Hopewell Valley Central High School on Oct. 23.
The Redbirds will also be the No. 1 seed in the NJSIAA Central Jersey, Group 3 sectional tournament. The seeds are not out yet, but Allentown, at this point of the season, has way more power points than any other team in that Group 3 section.
With such a talented team that gets so much attention, Allentown has every reason to feel pressure. But Maurer’s players are loose. They smile a lot and have fun playing the game.
“The players are a goofy team. Them being relaxed is them being goofy. I can’t tell them, ‘No one talk to each other, put a straight face on, get focused.’ We won the state last year and they were just having fun,” Maurer said. “They joke around and have fun in warmups. It drives me nuts but then I realized they are just loose. I have to let them be themselves. It’s good because they are not thinking too much about the big game.”
Maurer tried to make her players be serious a couple years ago. It didn’t work.
“We lost 3-0. Since then we’re like, ‘Just do your thing,’” Maurer said. “It’s worked because they’ve been loose. Not uptight and stressed out.”
There is one thing Allentown can be more serious about. The Redbirds have been starting slow in most games. They beat Ewing 8-0 on Oct. 17, but didn’t score for the first 30 minutes. A five-goal flurry in the last 10 minutes of the first half gave the Redbirds a huge halftime advantage.
“No matter who the opponent is, we need to play like state champions. We just can’t take these teams lightly. We have to put teams away early,” Maurer said. “So, that’s what we need to do. Score early.”
