STARKVILLE, Miss. — The Starkville High School Lady Jacket soccer team competed in their tenth game against South Panola, Friday, January 8, at home. 

The team won 8-0, leaving them with five wins, four losses and one tie so far this season.

Sophomore Emma Wilson scored two goals during the game. Wilson has high expectations for the team during the rest of the season. 

“My expectations for the rest of the season are for our team to grow in our abilities, win more games and encourage each other so we have healthy mindsets going into [the rest of] our games,” Wilson  said.

Wilson is proud of the way the team performed during the game, but still thinks they could improve in order to work better as a team. 

Wilson said even though the Lady Jackets won, they could work on “having creative runs” and “communicating a little more.” Other than that, Wilson said the team “does pretty well as a whole.” 

Senior Brianne Locke said there were unexpected obstacles that the team had to overcome this season. 

“Due to Covid, it’s been hard to keep a full roster. We either have girls quarantined or girls who are not able to make it,” Locke said. “Through all that, we’ve been able to continue to play just as strong, even when we are missing a few strong asset players to our team.” 

Locke is upset about this being her last high school soccer season, but is glad for the opportunity to be able to play with amazing teammates. 

“Even though this is my last season, and it has been far from normal, I have cherished every moment with my teammates,” Locke said. “I’m not necessarily sad that I probably won’t get to play soccer again, but I’m sad that I have to leave my teammates, [who] are some of the most supportive and uplifting girls I’ve ever played with.” 

The SHS Lady Jacket soccer team has three regular season games left. Their next game is January 11, 5:30 p.m. versus New Hope.