Yorktown's Boys Soccer Summer Season Starts

Yorktown lost its opener in the Lakeland summer league to powerhouse Byram Hills 4-0, Wednesday night. Yorktown played the Bobcats to a one-goal game in the first half before Byram Hills’ dominance took over in the second half.

Byram Hills has won four of the last five Section 1 Class A titles.

“I knew Byram Hills was going to be a good match,” Yorktown coach Ed Polchinski said. “Unfortunately, we had to play them the first game of the season and I knew it was going to be a tough match.”

Polchinski said that the contest was a good experience for his team because it showed the athletes what it takes to compete against one of the elite of Section 1.

“If you match against Byram Hills and you do well, you will be doing well during the regular season,” Polchinski said.

The summer season is important because it gives the coaches a chance to see how their players will play together during the summer in game situations, Polchinski said. It also gives JV players the opportunity to play against varsity level players.

That is why Polchinski said he tries to persuade his JV kids to come out for the summer league, so he could get a good look at them and see if they are capable of playing varsity soccer.

“It’s a good barometer, sometimes they don’t realize it themselves, but sometimes they are not ready to get up into the varsity level and they will stay down another year at JV," Polchinski said. "That helps the program. Everybody wants to play varsity when they come out for tryouts. This wakes them up a little bit.”

Polchinski said his philosophy is to give everyone a chance to play during the summer because that is what the league is for.

“We had our varsity goalie in the first half and our JV goalie in the second half,” Polchinski said. “The first 12 and a half minutes was our varsity squad and the second half was our JV squad. It’s nice to win but I am here to develop the guys and the bigger picture to me is starting in September not now.”

What Polchinski said he was hoping team members will feel more confident about themselves by the time the high-school season begins in September.

“I hope we will have molded as a team, getting better and knowing each other out there,” Polchinski said. “That’s is one of our goals, more or less, come together as a team."

The team lost four seniors last year and has 14 starters coming back. 

"By the end of the summer league, I will have a good idea of who will be a good help for the varsity team and who will not be," the coach said. "Not to say that someone else who wasn’t here, may walk on the field at captains’ practices or my tryouts and make varsity also.”