Girls Soccer: Northport 2011 Preview

The team returns 13 players –- seven of them seniors –- as they approach their 2011 season. For most teams, such little turnover tends to confer the benefits of experience. For the Tigers, it confers something more: the desire to right the wrong of a prodigious season cut short.

Those 13 players watched their 2010 team lose in penalty kicks, to Smithtown West, in the first round of the county tournament. It wasn’t the result they expected after finishing the regular season at 11-1-1, good enough for second place in the league.

“I think we were all kind of in shock because we had had such a successful season, and thinking that the first game wouldn’t be as challenging as it was,” Coach Aija Gipp recalled. “It was definitely a learning experience…I’m definitely going to be the motivator to get us where we need to be, mentally, for each game.”

Last Season: 11-1-1.

Coach: Aija Gipp.

Key Players: The Tigers have a rich supply of skill. Senior midfielder/forward Rosy Hayes and senior midfielder Kristi Abbate were all-state players in 2010. Hayes, who was also League II player of the year, earned the designation as a forward but is expected to play at midfield. She and Abbate have played soccer alongside each other in so many competitive contexts that Gipp sees every potential in their continued union.

Gipp expects particularly great things from Abbate, who has been saddled with injuries throughout each of the last three seasons. “This is the first season she’s come in feeling healthy, feeling strong, so she’s kind of at her peak for her high school career,” Gipp said. “Between her and Kristi it’s gonna be a great season.”

Abbate and Hayes share the team captaincy with Sara Ronde, a senior defender. All three, Gipp said, “are gonna be great leaders [and] great role models for the younger girls.”

Position Breakdown: Depth and speed are Northport's two greatest strengths. The team has a wealth of potential goalscorers –- which helps explain Gipp’s willingness to move Hayes to a less attacking position –- and they are fast both in the middle of the field and up front.

Expectations: The Tigers need that speed against West Islip and Sachem East, two major roadblocks to another finish in the top two. They’ll want it even more against Connetquot -- reigning, three-time league champions and a perennial thorn in Northport’s side.

“It’s always us and them, and it’s always a good game, always a dirty game,” Gipp said. The game also represents a contrast in styles, with physical Connetquot butting heads with sleeker Northport.

This year, of course, Northport will return to the rivalry with the benefit of experience -- and with the sense of unfinished business that only a squandered penalty shootout can bring.

Key Games:

• Sept. 21 - Northport @ Connetquot, 4:30 p.m.
• Sept. 23 - Sachem East @ Northport, 4 p.m.
• Oct. 11 - Northport @ West Islip, 4:30 p.m.
• Oct. 15 - Connetquot @ Northport, 2 p.m.
• Oct. 17 - Northport @ Sachem East, 4:30 p.m.
• Oct. 26 - West Islip @ Northport, 4 p.m.