Esko Girls Soccer Set to Rely on Defense Heading Into State Tournament

The Esko girls soccer team is gearing up for their 3rd straight trip to the state tournament.

ESKO, Minn.- The Esko girls soccer team is gearing up for their 3rd straight trip to the state tournament.

Esko drew the five seed in the AA tourney and will meet up with the four seed St. Cloud Cathedral, a team they have never played before.

Esko head coach Sharon Lahti said that this season has been a season of work for her team.

But it’s been different from their previous state tournament apperances, citing senior losses from the year prior.

She added even with the changes, one thing remains the same.

“My coaching philosophy, I build from the back. Without defense, you don’t have offense. So I always start with my defensive side and then build forward. As I’m looking at positions, who’s going to be where during the season, it’s just how I start to build my team. I reinforce to them all, we all play defense, we all play offense. But that defensive line, you have to have defense to create offense,” said Lahti.

Reese Kuklinski is one of the senior defenders for Esko.

She doubled down on the importance of having a strong defense, especially in these state tournament games.

“It’s super important because as much as you can score goals. You can’t win games if you’re getting scored on too. As a team, all you can hope for is you don’t get scored on and hope that the scoring comes. But if it doesn’t, then the worst case scenario is you go to PK’s or whatever. So yeah just stopping them I guess,” said Kuklinski.

The Crusaders and Esko begin battle on Thursday at 5:30 PM in Monticello.