The Parkland High School boys soccer team won both of its games last week and remains undefeated at 13-0 overall and in the Eastern Pennsylvania Conference. It has been just the first season that head coach Scott Mang was hoping for.

“The season is going great,” said Mang. “The coaching staff and the players are working diligently to get better each day. We have a wonderful booster club who treats us better than they should, and a very helpful athletic department who helps guide me along the way through year one. I love coming to training every day. We have sessions that are challenging, fun and exciting to watch. You can see the growth of the team on a daily basis.”

Mang is a tactical coach and his team has been winning a lot of games due to hard work and talent, but there are also other intangible things that have helped the Trojans play as one this season.

“We are fairly healthy as a team, which is rare at this point of the season, because there are so many games in such a short period of time,” Mang said. “We have had some wonderful team building experiences in addition to some team dinners, which always helps. The EPC is a great conference to play in. Each team brings their absolute best when playing Parkland and the opposing coaches and players are all excellent, so each of the 17 games is a battle.

“I think that the ‘we vs. me’ approach is working. We continually play the entire roster of 20 players in most games, which keeps people training hard and keeps everyone fresh. We are very balanced, we have 15 players who have scored multiple goals and 13 players who have assisted on those goals. We are starting to figure out what shapes we will play in, adjustments that need to be made during the course of the game within that system and players are now in more certain roles on the team and on the field. I also love the composure that we are showing on the field during the course of the game. This team is also one of the toughest teams that I have been around in a while. The field size and conditions don’t matter, the opponent doesn’t matter, the off-the-field distractions don’t affect us, and they know how to put in work.”

As he normally does, Mang deflected any individual success and focused more on the team as a whole.

“As far as standouts, it’s hard to say,” Mang said. “We have a back line that is pretty tough to get through. We have a group of central midfield players that work their socks off from box to box, we have forwards who are creative, lightning fast, and work hard as our first line of defense. We have a goalkeeper who commands the box, is a great shot stopper and great in the air. We have reserves that work tirelessly in training and when in games, they understand their role within the team and they are crucial to making this team better. I think at 13-0 our team stands out and I’m excited to see what we can continue to do over the course of the season.”

Parkland has a busy week this week with three games and finishes its regular season with five games in 10 days. The Trojans host Liberty and Whitehall, while traveling to Spring-Ford to round out the week.

“I hope we can stay healthy of course and continue to work daily on being the best version of us,” said Mang. “We have a very tough stretch of games coming up over the next two weeks and then we repeat all over for the EPC18 and District 11 tournaments.”