By the end of the 2025 boys soccer season, the McCracken County Mustangs found themselves as the First Region champions once again, their fifth title out of the past six seasons. Now heading into their 14th season as a program, the Mustangs are keeping their sights aimed as high as ever in the hopes of defending their title and earning their seventh overall First Region championship.
“Expectations are high here. We’re always going to make it our goal to progress in the postseason, but we also realize that the postseason doesn’t start until October, and we need to build up to our goals one step at a time,” said head coach Michael Wiersema, setting his standard ahead of his 12th year with the program. “Last year, our practice shirts said ‘stay hungry, stay humble’, and I thought they did a great job of doing just that. A lot of those guys are back this year, and we’re hoping to have similar, or even more success.”
The offseason work for Wiersema and the Mustangs has been ramping up over the past weeks, with the team recently partaking in a three-day camp at Centre College in the lead-up to their first scrimmages next week.
“The heat’s been trying to beat it out of them for the last couple of weeks, but they’re working hard and coming along well,” Wiersema continued. “We have some tough scrimmages coming up, so we’ll find out where we’re at pretty soon. But they’ve been doing well. They did well at Centre, and our goalkeeper Braxton Freeman was named the camp’s most outstanding keeper out of the 17 other teams there.”
Freeman represents one of the biggest changes within the expected starting 11 for the new season, as the senior has earned the nod as the Mustangs’ starter. Just ahead of him on the pitch, Weirsema has tabbed senior centre-back Johnny Mendoza as a major piece of the Mustangs’ defensive puzzle following a breakout junior campaign
“Maks Hazel and William O’Neill are going to be important for us,” Weirsema said, on the attacking midfield and winger duo. “Those are two of our captains, and just a couple of hard-working kids that have been playing some of the best soccer I’ve ever seen them play.”
As for how the Mustangs may approach their games when the season rolls around, Weirsema has put an emphasis on adaptability and the ability to be comfortable both in and out of possession. With plenty of top-caliber opposition on the schedule, the Mustangs expect to be ready for any situation they may find themselves in.
“We need to be able to play without the ball, because some of these teams that we’ve scheduled are going to want to dominate possession,” Weirsema concluded. “We’ll want to be effective on the counter-attack, and be able to stay in those games against top competition. But at the same time, we’re going to need to be comfortable playing with possession, because we’ll want to be able to control the ball in other games against different opposition.”
Following scrimmages with South Warren and St. Xavier on August 3 and 8, the Mustangs will officially open their season on Tuesday, the 11, playing host to Calloway County at 7 p.m.