The Warrenton boys soccer team will have holes to fill across the field before its first game of the season next week.

The Warriors lost six players to graduation, but Head Coach John Schulte hopes a group of experienced upperclassmen will help ease the transition this fall.

“We have a lot of upperclassmen who have played a lot for us, so we have some good experience coming back,” Schulte said. “And those guys will help the kids who don’t have the experience. It’s definitely going to be a building process this year to get kids in new roles after we had six seniors graduate last year. There are some vacancies out there, so we have to find kids that can fill those roles and we have to get them to know what they need to do out there. Once that happens, I hope we can hit our stride by midseason or so.”

Warrenton lost goalie Matt Dildine, midfielders Paul Lanigan and Taylor Lutz, and defenders Keagan Michelson, Conrad Schaumberg and Danny Van Dillen off last year’s team that finished 13-9-1.

There are bright spots returning, however.

Senior forward Nick Forrest returns after leading the team with 38 goals last season.

He teams with junior midfielder Isaac Frederick, who was second on the roster with 12 goals while leading the way with 21 assists.

Juniors Andrew Hodgson and Garrett Sommer have also caught the eye of Schulte.

“Those guys have been playing for a while and they should all have big seasons,” he said. “Nick has scored a bunch for us in the past and we hope he does that again this year, too. With the structure of the team being different, hopefully we can get him the ball. Isaac is looking great back there and he’s bigger and stronger than ever. I’m looking for a big season out of him and I know he’s going to get a lot more goals this year, too.”

The goalie position is still up in the air, and Schulte hopes to find a starter before the season opener Aug. 19 against Fort Zumwalt East in the Fort Zumwalt East Soccer Classic.

“There are a few guys who want to play back there, so we’re battling it out right now to see who is going to take that spot,” he said. “That’s one of our weak links because we don’t have anyone coming back to play that position like we’ve had in years past.”

A lack of depth across the program hasn’t made Schulte’s job any easier.

As of Monday morning, Schulte had 20 players throughout the entire program.

“When you have low numbers you just have to work on your skills and kids really have to know how to play because they’ll get a lot of playing time,” he said.

The Warriors are expected to deploy a 4-4-2 (four defenders, four midfielders and two forwards) or a 4-5-1 attack, depending on the opponent.

They will also play Francis Howell (Aug. 21) and Ritenour (Aug. 23) in the Zumwalt East Classic before hosting St. Charles Aug. 25 in their home opener.

They will compete in the Pacific Tournament (Aug. 28-31) and Francis Howell Central Tournament (Sept. 11-14).

But for now, Schulte isn’t looking any further than his first two opponents.

“That will be tough because those are two huge programs,” he said of Zumwalt East and Francis Howell. “We’re looking to build off what happens there and hopefully we have some coachable moments in those two games. We know those will be tough games but we’re hoping to learn from them, so when we get back to our conference we’ll be able to use that experience to help us out.”