By Christopher Tremblay

Over the past few seasons, the Norwood girls soccer team has found themselves looking up in the Tri-Valley League standings. Mustang Coach Kim Brinklow has not been able to attract a large pool of athletes to come out for the team, instead they gravitated towards field hockey and basketball. 

With the lack of talent gracing their rosters, Norwood has not had too many successful seasons.

“The Tri-Valley League is very tough with many of the teams we go up against going deep into the playoffs on a regular basis,” Brinklow said. “While we haven’t been very good, we have gotten more competitive over the years, but we just haven’t been able to get over the hump.”

While this year’s games have been closer, the Mustangs have yet to secure their first win. Brinklow knows that this season is going to continue to be tough but sees the clouds breaking and the silver lining coming in the near future.

“We’ve connected with the youth program and over the next few years we should start to reap the benefits,” Brinklow said. “There are a lot of seventh and eighth graders who play soccer year-round that will be moving into the high school over the next few years.”

Not only will the younger girls be making their way up, Brinklow and her team have been putting together clinics for girls in the fifth through eighth grades to give them not only the skills but the incentive to play the sport on a high level. During their last clinic, some 150 girls attended, which could bode for a bright future of Norwood girls soccer.

In addition to the upcoming seventh and eighth graders, Brinklow noted the Norwood’s junior varsity program has already started the improvement process and have been putting together a rather successful season; with this, she believes that the building process has already begun for the varsity team.

Leading the team into the future are juniors Mackenzie Flynn and Riley Barnett; they should be with the team next fall when the first wave of talented young soccer players arrives.

Flynn is the team’s center midfielder; the general on the field according to the coach and one with a smart soccer IQ. She plays the sport year-round and has the leadership qualities to encourage the girls to take their game to the next level.

Barnett is always providing the effort and is fearless on the field. She plays the holding center-midfield position, while Flynn is the attacker. Norwood likes to play double center-midfielders instead of those side by side. They’re playing on top of one another to give the team more power through the middle of the field.

Although Flynn and Barnett will be part of the Mustangs future come next fall, seniors Catherin Crowin (left mid or defense), Elizabeth Gonzalez (in the middle with Flynn and Barnett) and Mary Flaherty (right back who has unfortunately been hit with the injury bug), are the team’s captains this fall. 

“They’ve got the commitment and have given us the effort each and every game,” Brinklow said.

Norwood has increased its competitiveness this season but still find themselves lacking on the scoring end. According to the coach, the scores of the Mustangs games don’t reflect the competitiveness on the field and their outcome would look much different if they could find a way to put the ball in the back of the net, which has been a big problem.

Having a scoring problem is something that has affected the team this year, but Brinklow has seen some improvement over the last few games and likes what she has seen.

Underclassmen who have been able to propel the team in scoring lately have been Flynn, junior Ava Papetti, sophomore Megan Molloy, and freshman Gia Riccardi.

“We definitely have been increasing our passing and movement of the ball,” Brinklow said. “We are able to create a lot more scoring opportunities now, something that we were not able to do in the past.”

Junior CeCe Becker has shown to be somewhat of a surprise for the Mustangs this fall. She has not only improved her game tremendously, but she is also one of those girls moving the ball and helping to create the space and opportunity.

Prior to the season, Brinklow wanted the team to be competitive and keep the games relatively low scoring. In doing that, she also wanted to develop the team’s ability to score while also defending the opposition’s sets and corner kicks.

“We may not have won a game yet, but the girls have had good communication on the field in practices as of late,” Brinklow said. “They’ve worked extremely hard together and are fighting for one another.”

Come the end of the season, Norwood may not have the win-lose record they would have liked, but they do know that the future of the team looks bright and that the sun will soon be rising on them sooner than later.