It’s a little early to be talking title favorites among the field hockey teams in the Santa Clara Valley Athletic League–after all, the league season just started last week. Still, the Saratoga girls are showing early signs that they should definitely be part of that conversation.
Certainly two-time defending league champion Los Gatos has to be considered a favorite, and perennial powerhouse Monta Vista can’t be left out of the mix. But how about those Falcons?
Saratoga is off to a tremendous start in the 2015 season. The Falcons opened SCVAL play with two wins last week, outscoring Cupertino 5-3 before blanking Homestead 6-0. The two victories helped the Falcons improve to 5-0-1 for the season.
Junior forward Tina Miller pounded home three goals and junior forward Kelsey Kinoshita had a goal and an assist in the lopsided win over the Mustangs last week. Senior Erin Norris and junior Maxine Parr also scored goals for the Falcons and juniors Emily Chen and Hannah Leonard had assists.
Saratoga opened up a commanding 5-0 lead by halftime, then coasted from there to the 6-0 victory.
Things were much closer for the Falcons in their league opener at Cupertino two days earlier. Saratoga went up 3-1 by intermission, but had to match the Pioneers’ two second-half goals to pull out the 5-3 win.
Miller topped ‘Toga with two goals and Norris contributed a goal and an assist. Chen and Kinoshita also popped goals and Parr had an assist.
Cupertino standout Solin Piercy led the Pioneers with three goals.
The Pioneers battled back later in the week with a 3-1 win over Lynbrook to even their record at 1-1 in league and 3-3 for the year. Piercy, Emily Burke and Ashley Bradac each scored goals for Cupertino in the win.
Caitlyn Lee drilled the lone goal in the loss for the Vikings, who slipped to 0-2 in league play with the loss that followed a 2-1 setback at the hands of Los Altos earlier in the week. The Vikings are winless at 0-5 overall this season.
Monta Vista, like Cupertino, is even at 1-1 in the early stages of the 2015 league season. The Matadors were blanked 7-0 by Los Gatos but fought back with a thrilling 1-0 victory over Los Altos.
Allegra Ziegler Hunts drilled a first-half goal off an assist from Julia Lu and that would stand up for a 1-0 victory for the Mats against the Eagles.
Monta Vista is 3-3-1 overall this year, a mark that includes a win and two losses in the Longhorn Round-Up Tournament at Leigh High School.
Kristina Wang scored a goal in the first half, set up off of assists from Lu and Ziegler Hunts, to lead the Mats to a 1-0 win over Corning, but they lost 1-0 to Prospect and 2-1 to Gilroy. Danielle Koontz scored the Monta Vista goal against the Mustangs.
