SWAMPSCOTT — Continuity has been a theme – perhaps the theme – for Swampscott’s girls soccer team this offseason.
With nearly its entire starting lineup returning, third-year coach Jaymie Caponigro believes her group is poised to play well.
“As a coach, I’ve been pretty lucky this year,” she said. “It’s nice to see our group come in and work together, but also be a year stronger, a year older, and see things take shape from there.”
The Big Blue bring back senior captains Fiona Keaney and Sam Ward, while a large junior class that has been with Caponigro since her debut season continues to grow.
“We have juniors like Greta Siefken, Cecilia Tripp, Lyla Rogers, Jane Raymond, Valentine Park, and our goalie Eve Byrne stepping into leadership roles,” Caponigro said. “Seeing those players be juniors and having more of a voice, and being better leaders has been nice to see.”
Watching underclassmen grow into upperclassmen leaders has been rewarding for Caponigro, whose father, Joe, helms the varsity baseball squad.
“Not just their development with their soccer skills – but now, their development as leaders,” she said.”
The Big Blue spent the preseason testing themselves with a packed slate of scrimmages, including a jamboree at Lynnfield High and matchups against Essex Tech and Newburyport. Swampscott will also scrimmage Stoneham this weekend.
“We put a lot of scrimmages into preseason this year, just to give our program opportunities to play together and get into game shape,” Caponigro said. “From a coaching perspective, it helps our staff to see who works well together and allows us to try different players in different positions.”
Regular season action begins Wednesday in Saugus. From there, Swampscott faces a challenging non-league schedule that includes St. Mary’s, Malden Catholic, Bishop Fenwick, Cambridge Rindge and Latin, and Hamilton-Wenham.
“All five of our non-league games feature extremely strong teams,” Caponigro said. “I think, as a program, it is kind of just what our standard is and the level we want to compete at.”
With a strong core and culture of competition, Caponigro believes the Big Blue are ready to make big-time noise.
“One of our strengths is that we’ve played together before. We’re not working with a ton of new players, and having a big junior class working with our senior class helps set a leadership standard for the underclassmen to continue what we’ve worked so hard on the past couple of years.”
When asked how she was feeling ahead of year three, Caponigro, an Endicott College graduate, was quick to respond.
“I’m definitely excited. The last couple of years, we always found a way to compete or tried to. As a coach, that’s all you can ask for – to work hard and try and find a way to compete. Having taught those skills the last couple of years, it’s exciting to go into the third year with the same mentality and find a way to compete and be in every game.”
