Girls Soccer blanks Marshall

The New Ulm High School girl’s soccer team is fortunate enough to have their season due to the impact of COVID-19. 

The girls won 5-0 against Marshall, on September 8th, 2020. This was the team’s third game this season. 

According to team captain Paige Kalis,, “This game was actually very beneficial for our team because we clicked very well and our passing was A1.” 

The conditions of the game were chilly as the high for that particular day was only 48 °F. According to the goalie and team captain, Kendra Nesvold, when playing in the cold “the ball is harder and it skips so it hurts my hands more. My feet are numb too.” Playing on turf, which is where they were playing on Tuesday, is better according to Nesvold, “because there are no bumps on the turf, it’s just flat.”

The girls’ coach, Jonathan Johnson, was very pleased with how the girls played, saying, “I think the team did great tonight. They were communicating well on the field and they were passing the ball and receiving the ball really well. Their passes were to the destination they were aiming for, so I was really happy with that. We had some really nice shots, our goaltending was immaculate.”

When asked about how the girls played this particular night versus other games against the Marshall team, Johnson replied, “We actually played them on Friday in Marshall, and tonight’s game was twice as good as what they did over in Marshall. Things were working better. They were a better team tonight and things were working in our favor. The girls took advantage of whatever mistakes that Marshall made and capitalized on them.”

COVID-19 has been something that is effecting many sports teams, including soccer. Although they were allowed to have a season, there are still many restrictions and limitations which is making things complicated for both Johnson and the team. “It’s been a huge pain. With the restrictions, we have to wear masks and all that kind of stuff. You can only have 25 people in a pod, and I can’t bring junior varsity players up to play on varsity to give them a higher level of experience and things like that. And that’s something we’ve done forever and now we can’t do it this year so there are some brokenhearted girls. I have a full roster on the bench so trying to squeeze 22 girls into a play during a game is very difficult.” says Johnson.