Coming Off A Successful Summer, Hightstown Boys Soccer Preps For Opener

If Tim Kalick is feeling anything in his gut as his Hightstown High boys soccer gets ready for the season, it's probably just because he skipped a meal or two.

"I don't have any gut feeling about this season," said Kalick, Hightstown's soccer coach. "We lost a lot from last year's team. We also have a lot of talented players back. It's just going to be a matter of how fast they develop."

Last year's team went 14-4-1 and made it all the way to the Central Jersey Group I finals, losing 1-0 to Holmdel.

"We lost in the last two minutes of the game," Kalick said. "It was heartbreaking. Hard to forget that one."

Just as hard as replacing some of the players on the team, starting with Kelvin Flores.

"He was the midfielder of the year for Mercer County the past two years," Kalick said. "He's playing for Mercer County Community College now. That was a huge loss."

Hightstown also needs to replace its goalie. Khawaja Hameed and Henry Zhingri, both seniors, will be given the chance to step into the vital goalie position.

"We lost six seniors that were starters, including our goalie," Kalick said. "It's hard to replace half your team. We just need guys to step up."

One area where Hightstown returns a strength is at forward. James Parris, a senior, lead the Colonial Valley Conference with 19 goals last year.

"He's been a dominant player in his three years with us," Kalick said. "James is a great goal scorer, but I expect that he'll be double teamed a lot this year. Because of that, we're going to need some other guys to step up in the scoring."

Ajani Crosley (seniors) and Jason Aguilar (sophomore) are the other forwards on the team.

Hightstown will also need to makeup for the loss of Flores in the midfield. The midfielders on the 2011 team are Tyler Mills (junior), Christian Aguirre (senior), Sergio Ojeda (senior), Dante Perez (sophomore), Max Hernandez (junior) and Andrew Gottfried

The defenders are Osmin Bernal (defense), Mark Pazmino (junior), Peter Kent (sophomore) and Thomas Rodriguez (senior).

This group is working to prepare for the season opener at 4 p.m. on Sept. 8 at Steinert.

"I think we'll be pretty good," Kalick said. "We had two teams in a summer league (one which made the semifinals in the Mercer County Summer League). We had a lot of guys that showed an interest in playing, which is nice. We've put in a lot of work. I think we'll be okay. We just have to see which guys step up to fill in some our openings. That's what's going to make this an interesting season."