Liberty Christian Academy girls soccer coach Zack Banze is focused on the team’s improvement, with only five upperclassmen on the team.

Banze is in his first year as head coach of the Eagles soccer team. He has served as an assistant for the program the past three years. The team only has three seniors and two juniors. There are 10 players who are sophomores, freshmen or in middle school, he said. Two top players could not participate in soccer this year because they accepted college scholarships for other sports, Banze said.

Banze admitted it is a challenge for middle school students to participate at the high school level but believes he has a good group of seniors that will help them adjust to the high school level of competition.

“It’s pretty tough,” Banze said. “We got real good seniors that kind of take them under their wing and show them the ropes and stuff. It’s tough to be trying to introduce middle schoolers to play against a five-or six-year age difference. It’s a hard gap to go with.”

The Eagles have spent good portion of the practices working on conditioning. They try to do conditioning with drills so that it is not just running, Banze said. They also have done a lot of ball work, footwork and drills focused on passing.

Banze conceded with 15 players on the team, there will not be too many extra players to utilize substitutions throughout the game.

“There’s not too many subs,” Banze said. “It makes it tough when you have 15. You would for sure like to have a few more than 15. So you have a few more subs for injuries or sickness. We’ve got a good solid group of kids that are coming out and playing and are enjoying themselves. So that’s the biggest thing is everybody enjoy themselves and want to come back out again next year.”

Banze said the Eagles have some players who stay in the same position, while others play different positions. They are pretty set on the defense but have forwards and midfielders alternate between positions.

The flow of the game will determine the Eagles’ strategy for the game, Banze said.

“We kind of go with how the game unfolds,” Banze said. “If you get ahead and you need to try and stick the game where it’s at, you can draw back some of your better players and stack your defense. Otherwise, you can go the other way if you’re down late in the game you can take some of your better players and stick them all up front and see what happens.”

The Eagles had multiple scrimmages in practice prior to their first game. They also have done drills to prepare the Eagles for game action, Banze said.

“You can get a pretty good idea in practice,” Banze said. “We do a lot of scrimmage. We do quite a bit of scrimmaging and three on two, three on one drills that gives you the opportunity to see what somebody can do in a given chance before you play a game.”

Liberty Christian’s focus will be on winning each game if they can, Banze said. Otherwise, their focus will be on improving each day.

“You can see on a daily basis the improvements that people are making and gaining,” Banze said. “That’s the biggest thing. Everybody’s getting better and everybody’s enjoying it. In the end, that’s really what matters. If you can learn something and enjoy it in the process. In the end, that’s what you’re going to remember.”

Liberty Christian is 1-1 on the season. Liberty Christian defeated Eagle Ridge Christian 3-2 Monday. Liberty Christian dropped their season opener 6-0 to Christian Fellowship.

The Eagles will square off against Wright City Friday.