This year, the Wilde Lake Girls’ Soccer team faced many changes, which wasn’t necessarily a new thing. The past couple of years have brought new coaches, new players, and new outcomes.
Many adjustments were made to the team’s atmosphere when we welcomed Ben Townsend as our new head coach for the 2025 season. The season began with a new coach and a fresh set of eyes, but primarily the same players. Coach Ben took on this role with a lot of hope and ambition. As players have experienced changes in coaches so often at Wilde Lake, we could see the direct impact of how new routines affect team achievement and relationships.
As a senior who has now played with three different coaches over my four years of high school soccer, I have found it necessary to quickly adjust and get used to new coaching norms, styles, and relationships. Along with the frequent changes in the coaching staff, it is evident that the roster size for the girls’ soccer team and player motivation have declined, which ultimately decreased the amount of success the team had on the field.
Freshman Miriam shared her initial reactions to the new experiences and environment that she had never been in before. She noticed that “we didn’t have as many players as a typical high school team,” which caused many challenges throughout the season. She stated that “walking into tryouts for the first time, not knowing much about high school soccer, and with such a small group of players, it was very concerning.” Personally, when I was a freshman in 2022, I saw and noticed these same situations. After I saw the number of players who had quit so early, I started asking myself and others around me, why?
Despite the coaching and roster changes this team has faced over the past couple of years, some of our team and player achievements have gone unnoticed. Last year, the girls were regional champs from the Maryland 2A division. This year, our very own forward, Tiffany Blakey, broke two outstanding records by scoring 25 goals, the most in a single season, and reaching a career total of 58 goals, which is the most in a single girls’ soccer career at Wilde Lake. Additionally, our sophomore goalie, Maggie Shidle, earned a huge achievement by breaking the record for the number of goals saved in a single season at Wilde Lake, with a total of 145 saves.
After Coach Ben’s first season of coaching, he thought that some of our outcomes could have been different “if we had more time to meld together.” From the get-go, he noticed the potential our team had with “tremendous athletes, good leaders, and hard work ethics,” which was admirable in itself. Coach Ben also recognized some of the struggles we had to face, including injuries, a lack of players, transportation issues, players having jobs, and trying to maintain schoolwork and mental health throughout the thick of the season. Through these countless challenges, Coach Ben stated that “the lack of recognition players received from outside of the school goes unnoticed,” and that he “had a great group of seniors who really worked to pull the season together with the time they had left.”
As a senior who has seen so much change in one sport over the course of my career, one thing that I have identified as a root of success is stability. By stability, I mean having routine, safety, balance, and security when it comes to the environment and relationships of the team. Stability is a major factor in any team environment, and it has been proven that stability is viewed as a critical factor for an effectively functioning and performing group. In sports, one way to establish a stable environment is with the coach. It has also been shown that a longer-term head coach can enhance a team’s overall performance. Obviously, there are many other factors that contribute to a team’s success, but for Wilde Lake Girls’ Soccer, having a stable and consistent coaching program may be the first step toward change and a more positive playing experience.
