By Kyle Roberts
With weather playing a factor for us all in North Louisiana over the last few weeks, Ruston High’s girls’ soccer team (6-7-1, 2-0 district) has had to make scheduling adjustments down the stretch as the final few district games are on the horizon.
Following some cancellations and rescheduling, longtime rival Neville High School is first up tonight for a road match.
“Originally, our schedule had a couple of non-district games mixed in with the the all important district matches,” Ruston head coach Jacquelyn Bean said. “Personally, I prefer it that way. If you see something you need to work on or change during a match, you have time to sort it before an upcoming district match. Mother Nature didn’t let us see it out that way. We had to altogether cancel our match versus Airline and we now have three district matches back to back to back this coming week.”
Leading up to tonight, Ruston’s team has had to deal with the injury bug but it coming out on the other side.
“Our squad is thin from a few injuries, but my girls are the strongest they’ve been all season,” Bean said. “They’re a young squad with only one senior, but we have a very competitive group this season. We’ve stood tall against some really good teams, playing a few in the higher division, the final score doesn’t show how close some of the matches really were. We’ve won 2-of-2 district matches played so far with three more to go, our last three games of the regular season.”
Following tonight’s Neville match, the Lady Bearcats will be prepping for Ouachita on Thursday, Jan. 25 and then West Ouachita on Jan. 29.
“We are set and ready to improve our ranking here in this final push to move higher in the power rankings before play-offs begin in a week and a half,” Bean said. “We want to host in the first round of 2023 like we did last year.”
