By RICHIE HALL
FISHERS – It might be hard to believe, but the Hamilton Southeastern girls soccer team has already played over a third of its games this season – just 11 days into their 2022 campaign.
The Royals have gotten quite a bit accomplished in that short period of time. Southeastern is unbeaten for the year, keeping its record unbeaten with a 3-0 win over Hoosier Crossroads Conference opponent Brownsburg Thursday at the Royals’ field.
The victory was significant for a few reasons. For one thing, it was a conference win, and Southeastern is now 2-0 in HCC play. It was also the Royals’ Senior Night, which is always a big occasion.
Then there are the rankings. Southeastern moved up to No. 1 in this week’s Indiana Soccer Coaches Association Class 3A poll.
“We’re proud of our heritage, but it also puts a target on your back every game,” said HSE coach Greg Davidson. “So, whether you’re ranked No. 1 or not, we still have to come out because we know we’re going to get everybody’s best game.”
The Royals came out ready to play, scoring within the first two minutes. Appropriately, it was two seniors that broke the ice: Caroline Kelley scored the goal off a Makenzie Loftin assist.
Kelley put in a second goal with under five minutes left in the first half, easily taking and making a penalty kick to give Southeastern a 2-0 lead.
Tatum Coleman scored HSE’s third goal during the 48th minute, completing the Royals’ scoring. Southeastern also played solid defense throughout the game, easily halting any scoring opportunity when the Bulldogs threatened to get close.
“With their defensive formation, they tried to counterattack, but my girls were able to handle pretty much every counter that they brought at us,” said Davidson.
Southeastern is now 6-0 for the season, and while Davidson said the Royals are “super proud of where we’re sitting in those first six games,” the team is not sitting on its laurels.
Davidson said “because of the teams that we played, we see the things that we continually have to work on the rest of the season” to get to where it wants to be once the post-season rolls around.
“We don’t believe that we’re the team that we want to be right now,” said Davidson. “As good as we’re playing, we’re going to continue to push to be even better.”
The Royals will get a huge test on Saturday evening when they travel to Noblesville for an HCC game with the 3A No. 2 Millers. For the past several seasons, that game had been played during the last week of the regular season, often to determine the conference champion. That was often coupled with the possibility of the two teams seeing each other again right away in the sectional.
“I’ve been trying to get this game changed for quite some time,” said Davidson. “I just think it’s just better for the Noblesville players and our Southeastern players. Just too many years where we’ve had to go back to back. And that’s just tough on those kids as high school kids.”
Davidson said the team is happy that “they don’t have the stress of that game” so close to the sectional. Now, the Royals can focus on that game as a rivalry and conference contest.
“Then we’ve got time, so we’ll continue to work on things that we have to be ready for the tournament,” said Davidson.