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Show Five Reasons For Viking Victories By DAVE WIGHAM Clipper Sports VIEWMONT -- Last Friday the Vikings of Viewmont hammered Skyline 4-0 under the lights in the first ever soccer game played at night at the school. With that win the Vikes moved into the state double elimination tournament tour-nament this week which was the dream of several sev-eral seniors on the team. JOEY SMITH, Vernaun Gines, Eddie Caw-ley Caw-ley and Lonnie Birkenfeld have been around Viewmont soccer for at least three years. Smith has played four years and this is their first trip into the state event. Add to these four senior Robyn Steenstra, who is in his first year of soccer at the school coming from the Netherlands, and you have the five seniors who wanted to go out in style at the state tournament. tour-nament. All five of these seniors are starters for the Viking team and each of them plays a big role in their success story. Robyn has become the goalie for the team, at the first of the season he was a halfback but as he notes "one of our goalies was sick and the other too short" so the coach moved Robyn into the nets. "It's not a totally new thing for me because I played in goal for two years back home so I did have some experience." Robyn wound up at Viewmont View-mont in an effort to prepare himself for BYU, "I wanted to go to college at BYU so we had some friends in Centerville so I decided to come a year early to learn the language better which should help me at college." JOEY SMITH has been a fixture on the Viewmont soccer team since his ninth grade year at Centerville Junior, this season the coaches have him playing a forward spot. Vernaun Ver-naun Gines is starting for his third year as a forward and lately he's turned into a scoring machine having scored seven goals in the last three games for the Vikes. Eddie Cawley and Lonnie Birkenfeld are two of the three fullbacks full-backs used by the Vikes and both of them have been responsible for keeping opponents from scoring. As juniors these kids almost made it into the state tournament but they lost 4-2 to Olympus in a playoff situation. "It was funny that we even got into the playoffs" noted Joey, "they took all the teams from our region to the playoffs." THIS SEASON they didn't worry about taking tak-ing all the teams as the Vikes placed second in region action behind the Darts of Davis, who suffered only one loss in league play and that was the Vikes a couple of weeks ago. One could almost see this success this season coming, com-ing, as sophomores this group had their problems prob-lems because the team had no seniors and was very young. Even with all these seniors returning the Vikes struggled in the early part of region play. "We have a new coach and it took time for him to realize what positions to put everyone in. Those first games we were shifting players all over the field trying to find the right combination" combina-tion" admitted Eddie. "Basically it took time for the coach and team to get to know each other" Lonnie added. THE NEW coach at Viewmont is Rodger Cushing, who coached the Vikes years ago, and the players point to him as a big reason for their success. "Cush is always into the games, always thinking soccer" noted Vernaun, "he really gets us excited for the games" added Lonnie. Helping coach this season is Bryan Gines, an ex-Viking player, "he knows the tatics about the game" his brother Vernaun conceeded, "he knows more about soccer than anyone on the team so we listen" added Robyn. These guys are ready for the state tournament, tourna-ment, they have been waiting for three years or more, and they feel the region has helped prepare pre-pare them for it. "We have the toughest league in the state" Joey proudly noted, "I don't know if we're the toughest but it's" certainly the most even region around. We read where some teams win 13-0 and that just doesn't happen in our league" Lonnie noted. "Some leagues may have stronger teams than ours, time will tell, but they also have some weak teams in those leagues. We didn't have a weak team in region" Eddie summed up. ANOTHER REASON for their success has been the play of the under classman, something some-thing these seniors are quick to point out. "Chris Beckman is unreal, "Vernaun confessed confes-sed "he just knows where everyone is on the field at all times. He's the playmaker of the team, I know most of my goals have come as a if . - y:: 'n y j J If r , - ., j , N- s i Y"CI k y fir I f V; tv , j I ' ,". " 4,? . . -'. - , y v - - . , - " ' - A core of five seniors has lead the Vikings into the state playoffs and past several highlv touted teams. I'laveis are, Joev Smith, Eddie Cawlev. hack row, Lonnie Birkenfeld , Robyn Steenstra and Vernaun Uines. result of one of his passes." "We knew the sophomores on the team would be good but not as good as they've played. They've really been impressive" added Joey. In talking about their chances to take the state tournament these seniors are very honest. hon-est. "We have to play with the same intensity that we've had the last couple of games" said Joey. "Eighty minutes of full out effort and never let down" Robyn. "Get good play from everyone including our subs" Eddie. "We need to play five good games, we can't afford a bad game" Lonnie. THEN VERNAUN summed up their feelings, "we honestly feel that in the games we've lost we've beaten ourselves. We just haven't played play-ed well. Then other times we've won and maybe we shouldn't have. If we play up to our potential then we feel we can play with anyone. If we don't then any of those teams can beat us." Right now though these seniors are on cloud nine simply to get a chance to play in the state tournament. They have waited a long time for this to come around and they aren't about to let it slip away without a hard honest effort. |