The Times - Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley

PRESCOTT - Some coaches worry about hav­ing enough players to field a team for the season. But that's not Mark Grimm's challenge. He could field two if he had to.

The WP Tigers' head soc­cer coach starts the season with 26 athletes on the ros­ter, including six freshmen and some seven talented for­wards/ strikers, giving him plenty of firepower up front.

What he doesn't have yet is a solid shield in the back, or a team that has brought together its diverse play­ing styles into a cohesive system.

"This squad has unlim­ited potential," said Grimm, now in his third year as a head coach. "We can score on anyone, but the back (de­fensive) half will determine the outcome (of the season). We need experience playing together as a unit."

After going all the way and winning the state cham­pionship in 2011, the Tigers were knocked out of the playoffs in the quarter finals last year. Making sure that doesn't happen in 2013 is a big motivator for the coaches and the players.

Most of the current squad was there. Starting with the seniors, defenders Al­berto Sandoval and Enrique Valveras, and midfielders Emily Wilson and Abraham Sanchez are all back with Sandoval, Valveras and San­chez in their fourth year as starters.

Juniors Ernesto Valdo­vinos, a striker, and Jose Pananigue, a midfielder, are back with forward wing player Johnny Escalante. Equally athletic but less ex­perienced, are juniors Paul Zamora on defense, Oscar Villalvavo on mid-wing and Salomon Martinez, a brand new addition to the team whose ball-handling skills are improving quickly, Grimm said.

Among the returning sophomores are forwards Rodrigo Gonzalez and Luis Garcia, midfielder/defender Alberto Mendez, and Trey Potts, son of assistant coach Jay Potts who's beginning to master the sport. He can run "and will be a big part of the team this year," Grimm said.

Midfielder and senior Giovani Gonzalez was the only one who missed a year. New sophomores this year are Jonathan Albarran and Adolfo Armenta, both of whom have moves and speed but are still working on "first touches." That's a term that describes their abil­ity to pass the ball quickly and accurately to help the team sustain possession and move the ball with vision and strategy rather than panic.

Among the half dozen freshmen to join the team, two will be starters: Chris­tian Caro, a defensive player currently (but not necessar­ily permanently) on goal, and Ivan Figueroa, a striker. Oscar Garcia and Jay Potts' younger son Andre are ex­pected to play midfield, while Tyler Fedderson and Jovany Zuniga will go up front.

Grimm said he hasn't settled on a starting goalie. Caro is solid in the posi­tion, as he demonstrated in Friday's game against Riv­erside. But he's versatile and can be deployed anywhere in the field. Garcia is also a candidate to guard the net.

If the Tigers want to get past the likes of St. George in Spokane or Northwest Christian in Lacey, they're going to have to become the "possession team" Grimm strives for every year. That means they have to get to know each other thorough­ly and play together well enough to forge a unit, a well-oiled playing and win­ning machine.

"We've got the bodies," Grimm said. "Now we need to coach 'em up. The poten­tial is there to go all the way. Our expectation is that we're going to (state championship games) in Sumner. But it's a long road to (the third week of) November."