SA sees good with bad in season-opening loss

It was just the kind of test that head coach John Morgan wanted for his Starkville Academy Lady Volunteers on the soccer pitch Tuesday.

Morgan knew that Jackson Academy was going to come in and give a very strong effort against Starkville Academy. He wanted to see how his Lady Vols would respond.

Even though Starkville Academy lost a 4-0 decision in its seasonopener at the Starkville Sportsplex, Morgan saw some good to go along with the bad.

“Honestly, this is what these first games are for,” Morgan said. “We had a scrimmage against Bayou where we saw a few things, saw some things that worked and a few things we liked, but you really want to get baptized by fire. (Jackson Academy's) Coach said they haven't even been beaten in two and a half years. That's kind of the test you want because they are really going to open you up to see what's not working, what is working and where things can be better so as I told the girls, you don't want to lose, but at the same time, you've got to take the positives with the negatives. Now we're be able to see what needs to be fixed, work on it and we have until next Thursday to fix it.”

The Lady Vols only have two seniors on the team this year with Meri Laci Archer and Anna Card with three juniors and four sophomores.

That means Morgan has a young team that has an opportunity to grow and an opening match with Jackson Academy took much of the guessing out of where Starkville Academy goes from here.

“This is what we want to see year in and year out,” Morgan said. “That's where we want to take this program. We want to compete with the (Jackson Academys) and (Jackson Preps) year in and year out, so you definitely want to start with a team like this and this strong. They punch you in the nose, then you say where can we fix things and move on from there.”

The Lady Vols have nine days before playing their next match and

it's a district encounter against Lamar School August 8 on the road.

Archer understands that Tuesday was just a small blip on the screen of what the season holds and there is time to getting better starting with the next practice.

“It was a loss, but it wasn't a failure,” Archer said. “We understand that we have the pieces. Now, we're just going to work the rest of the season to put the puzzle together.”