The Emmaus girls soccer team finished last season with a 15-5-1 overall record, taking silver medals in the East Penn Conference tournament.

Unfortunately for the Hornets, the team wound up facing a juggernaut Freedom team in the first round of districts and lost a hard-fought contest by a 2-1 score to end their season. Meanwhile, the Patriots went on to win District 11 gold and reach the quarterfinals of the PIAA tournament.

Last year’s Emmaus team was loaded with 14 seniors, which would seem to give Emmaus a tough hand to deal with for the upcoming season. Instead, Emmaus is looking to just go about its business and reload with some younger players who have put in their dues either coming off the bench or playing at the junior varsity level.

“We put an emphasis on young players getting some minutes and really working to be able to step into the lineup at the varsity level,” said Emmaus head coach Sarah Oswald. “We’ve been able to evaluate young players early on and have found some players to step up this season.”

Oswald will have three freshmen and one sophomore on this year’s roster.

One key loss is in goal where Alexa Ryan graduated and left a hole to be filled. Oswald hasn’t settled on a starter but has two players who are fighting to get the chance to start in goal. Senior Gabby Kreiner is battling with Molly Weinberger to start in Saturday’s opener at Dieruff.

“They’re both working very hard and it’s going to be a tough decision,” said Oswald.

The early work for Emmaus has focused a lot on building a strong defense to play in front of whoever wins the goalie battle. With a lot of progress on the defensive side, the work turned to focusing on scoring goals.

“We’re taking a week or so to really work on tactics and the players are really working hard and they’re excelling at practice,” said Oswald. “It’s a weird season because normally when you’re a few days away from the season you have played a couple scrimmage games and it’s easier to get a feel for where you’re at. We may have a couple things to work out early on but we’re in good shape.”

The start of the season was pushed back and the East Penn Conference schedule will have teams only playing against teams in their own county to cut back on travel and potential exposure to the virus. The 10-game schedule has games against the division rivals – Allen, Central Catholic, Dieruff, Parkland and Whitehall – grouped in pairs, with Emmaus’ season opening with a road game and then a home game against Dieruff. The Hornets also have a non-conference game scheduled against Southern Lehigh in the middle of next month.

Because of the changes to the schedule, the EPC won’t have a conference tournament this season, but districts and states are still scheduled and Emmaus figures to be competing in the District 11 playoffs.

The coronavirus has made this a very weird season for coaches and players alike. Oswald was glad to see that they had consistent numbers at voluntary workouts this summer and has stressed the new protocols to her players, who she says have taken them seriously.

“East Penn put a really good program in place and the athletic trainers have been on top of everything,” said Oswald of the precautions to protect players, coaches and other staff from exposure. “Our players abide by all of the policies and I think that if we continue to follow them, we’ll be okay and won’t have any issues.”

Oswald believes her players are ready to start the season and get to play meaningful games after a lot of intra-squad practices.

“The girls take practice very seriously but I also think it’s time to start playing against other schools and take everything we’ve been working on and put it into practice,” said Oswald.