See what Coach Odie Guzman and some of his players had to say about the upcoming Lexington Christian boys’ soccer season.
Jared Peck, Real-Time Sports Reporter for the Lexington Herald-Leader and co-founder of SoccerintheBluegrass.com, visited all nine Lexington high schools and spoke with coaches and players about the upcoming season. Over the next several days, SITB will release the notes and videos from those interviews that were used for the Herald-Leader’s preseason preview: Boys’ soccer: Will state’s toughest region turn out a new contender?
KHSAA link: Lexington Christian schedule
Coach Odie Guzman
It’s been a good preseason. I believe that these guys have done a tremendous job. It’s a good brotherhood to be a part of and we’ve got a couple of key players that will help us out.
Attacking center midfielders. Taco and Tyler. I think they bring a whole different dynamic to the game, especially with the creativity and their touches. Taco is going to be a freshman. Tyler is going to be a senior. The good thing is that they’ll be able to play alongside each other. So, we’ve got veterans with a lot of experience with a player that has the energy, the amount of creativity to help the team out. Both of them will give us a lot of ideas up top and a lot of chances for our forwards and outside midfielders.
Outside backs. I’ve got two senior outside backs that are solid players. They have the hard work and determination to not let anybody beat them. You’ll see that with our back line, although we have a good attacking front, our back line is going to be solid with those two outside backs, which is Ethan Gillispie and Alex Hodge. They’ll be going box-to-box. I’m looking for them to make those overlapping runs and be a part of the attack. That will give us a couple of more players and ideas there in the attacking third.
What I bring to the table is the energy for these guys and just a couple of more ideas in the attacking front. I was a center midfielder, an attacking center mid, so, creativity up top and movement off the ball and off each of the players, I feel like I can give them a couple of more ideas there.
Tyler Dobbs
I’m excited. I think he’s going to be really good for this program in upcoming years.
He can relate to us. That’s what’s nice. It’s really going to help us.
Winning districts, that’s always been the goal since freshman year and we’ve been working toward it every year. This is our last chance.
I think it’s going to be a fast-paced game, getting up and back, offensive and defensive. Quick buildup and getting through.
(High pressure) … is what we have to do. LCA is not a powerhouse name for high school soccer, so you’ve got to bring some intensity and shake some teams up.
You’re going to have Catholic and Dunbar trying to possess it a lot more and we’ve got to catch them on the breaks and counter attack, because they’re going to want to hold onto the ball.
Bradley Hargess
It’s going to be a great year. We’re going to be pretty good this year, actually.
I’m pretty confident this year. We’ve got 6 club players in the middle and up top, that’s a first for us.
It’s exciting this year. I haven’t ever really felt like we actually had a chance of beating everyone (until this year.)
