The new season of high school soccer kicks off for the Columbus Wildcats tonight with a doubleheader at West Liberty. The Columbus boys rode a strong senior class to 12 wins last year and a trip to a substate championship game. Returners like senior Daniel Martinez will need to step into bigger roles this season, and head coach Luis Cacho says junior goalkeeper Jacob Haines and the defenders will be essential to more success.

“Our policy is that we’ve got to build out the team from the back four,” Cacho says. “What I’ve been working on right now is figuring out [those] defenders, because we lost three of our defenders [from] last year. We’re working on that first, and then we build up the midfield and go on from there.”

The Columbus girls will need more goal-scoring production if they hope to improve on last year’s two wins. With last year’s leading goal-scorer, Juvixsa Valdez, moving on, junior Lecet Quiroz and sophomore Samarah Garza will be asked to lead the attack. Head coach Alfredo Piedra says playing better late last season should provide some momentum in 2023.

“At the end, we started really clicking,” Piedra says. “We’re carrying that over into this year. We’ve got a lot of youngsters coming back, and we’re excited.”

Columbus takes on the West Liberty Comets to kick off the new season this evening, with the girls’ game getting things started at 5.