The Bakersfield College men’s soccer club began the season on Feb. 23 with a 3-0 win at Bakersfield College against the cross-town CSUB Coyote Soccer club.
The Renegades are playing in the West Coast Soccer League Association in the Central Division. The Renegades must place amongst the top two teams, in a five game season, in order for a high ranking.
“Our first game people were nervous…people were making mistakes left and right,” said Saul Ortega, who is captain and team founder.
Maybe after a few more practices and games under their belt, the Renegades can get into a rhythm that will carry them for the rest of the season.
Saul sounded optimistic with the outcome of the first game saying, “I think the first 10 minutes everyone was nervous…but then after that, I don’t know, everything changed…players started communicating, a lot of great communication, a lot of good passes, I don’t know, I have to say the team played pretty hard for this first win.”
The Renegades played their second game at BC on March 1. On this rainy day the Renegades were routed to the tune of a 5-0 loss to the UCLA men’s soccer club.
“We needed more pressure, more talking out there, more communication, it was a tough team,” said Rafael Diaz who plays the left wing position for the Renegades. “I think we were a little more scared of the name [UCLA] than we were of the players,” said Diaz. The Renegades were pressured the entire day having to play more defense than offense.
The Renegades went into the half down 2-0.
Head Coach Justin Finch told his players at the half, “Our formation looked very scrambled…also, our outside mid’s and outside backs were having a hard time with their outside mid’s and outside backs.” Finch said.
“They were able to put two quick goals away in the first half and we had to chase the game from then on.”
When asked if the weather had any effect on the poor play by his team, Coach Finch refused to use the weather as an excuse but did say, “…it just looked like we had a harder time with it.”
One adjustment Coach Finch says the Renegades need to make before its next game is on the midfield.
“Midfielders working in triangles so we can get the ball to our outside mid’s and to our striker and linking from there so we can get forward much quicker than we were today.”
“This is only our second game together we had a good week last week [Feb. 23]…obviously UCLA is a little more established club team and obviously it’s shown how we played compared to their play, but luckily we have three weeks off that we will be able to work on certain things.”
The team looked like it couldn’t get any offensive rhythm going in the entire first half and it seemed to carry on into the second half. The lack of communication looked like it had a huge impact on the game and perhaps that can change during the Renegades bye week coming up.
The Renegades will have the next three weeks off before they host CSU Northridge’s soccer club on March 22.