TENINO — Tradition rarely dies.
Well before Dave Montgomery roamed the sidelines, the consistency around the Tenino High School girls soccer program has been strong turnouts for summer soccer.
Practices, mid-week scrimmages and weekend tournaments have been filled with red and black jersey tops. Anyone and everyone that is a Beaver soccer player spends June and July on the pitch.
“It is encouraging because I know other programs around the area, they put out the call for summer activities and they have a hard time pulling numbers,” Montgomery said. “The girls have a fun time, too.”
Nearing the seventh annual Battle on the Blacktop tournament, Tenino has gotten in plenty of close-match situations with a 2-1 loss to Centralia last week and drawing with W.F. West 2-2 on Tuesday.
Within the final couple minutes versus the Tigers, the Beavers had two chances at the net and couldn’t bury them. They scored twice in the final three minutes against the Bearcats to erase a two-goal deficit.
“I always tell the kids if you have family vacations, I want you to go do that,” Montgomery said. “The expectation is if you're around (town), come on out and the girls know that. They all care.”
Twenty-plus players available has made it quite the challenge for Montgomery to use subs and get everyone as much time on the field as possible. He mixed in three-to-five subs per period against Centralia.
Tenino hasn’t stuck to a go-to formation yet. It has tinkered with a handful to find the one that best fits the roster, one that brings back perennial goal scorer Callie Mickelson and winger Kyla Watson amongst others.
“It is really cool to see people fill in some roles,” Montgomery said. “That’s what summer is all about, trying to improve and build some momentum when the regular season comes around.”
Maria Summers scored the lone goal versus Centralia while Watson and Elizabeth Duarte found the back of the net versus W.F. West.
Tenino will have two teams at the Kick in the Grass tournament held in Tumwater this weekend. The U19 group will be Montgomery’s likely varsity roster, with the U15 squad mostly made up of freshmen and eighth graders that could see time down the line at the varsity level.
“When you have so many players and they’re all pushing for minutes, we can be really flexible,” Montgomery said.
Still, this summer has opened his eyes to what the Beavers could accomplish when the season starts in almost a month.
“By the time we get to the Battle on the Blacktop, we’ll have what we figure will be the projected starters and those several subs,” he said.
