Year after year after year, the Redwood Rangers continue to remain the cream of the crop in Tulare County for high school girls’ soccer.
Even when they graduate one of their leading goal-scorers, lose their top distributor, or exhaust the eligibility of their veteran defensive back line, one thing remains constant — winning, and winning frequently.
That’s been the case for nearly two decades now under longtime head coach Jason Vieira.
The Rangers (19-1-1, 8-0) clinched their fourth straight East Yosemite League championship this season, capturing their 14th conference title in 15 seasons as of Feb. 2
How have the Rangers been able to maintain that excellence while sustaining a championship culture?
“Great players,” Vieira said. “We’re able to get kids to buy into what we do. Every kind of older group just carries that legacy forward, you know. It helps when you’re cooking with the right ingredients. I take a lot of pride in being able to fill a team that is going to play hard regardless of the opponent, but when you have kids like Miranda Ortiz or Kywn Bruce, it makes it a lot easier, and every year, we’re just fortunate to have great kids come through here.
“As coaches, we’re just trying to make them understand the way we want them to play, and give them the freedom to do whatever they want on the field when it comes to creativity, taking chances, and it’s worked out. We’ve had a lot of success.”
That’s true.
Since his arrival — Vieira’s first season was the 2011-12 campaign — Redwood has averaged 18.6 wins per season and has won a league championship in every year with the exception of the COVID-19-impacted spring 2020-21 stretch.
During that run, Vieira’s teams have won 279 games, including a Central Section Division II championship in 2017.
That dominance may be attributed to Vieira maintaining a winning culture through determination, grit, and hard work, and a team-first philosophy, where the veterans embrace taking younger players under their wings.
Just take a look at the Rangers.
Ortiz, who burst onto the scene last year with a team-leading 30 goals as a freshman, became the fastest player in the Vieira era to reach 50 career goals in just 45 varsity matches. She has 20 goals this season.
The sophomore attacking midfielder is also only the fifth Ranger since 2011 to achieve 50 career goals.
The others?
Brooke Crisp (102 goals), Evan House (77), Maddy Messier (76) and Jayme Gomez (58).
House, Messier and Gomez all went on to play at the college level. House suited up at the NCAA Division I level at San Jose State.
Crisp, who led the Rangers to a section title in 2017, studied at UCLA.
Those four aforementioned Redwood grads set and elevated the standard and passed on the tradition to the next generation of Ranger players.
“It’s great,” Vieira said. “Every time you think you’re closer to the end of your career coaching than the beginning, a new freshman group comes in, and they’re just amazing kids to work with. You just fall in love with the game. You fall in love with the team.
“As a varsity coach, it’s very cool to see seniors and freshmen interact. They’re different stages of high school, but it’s awesome to see their friendships gel and grow. A lot of the friendships we have on the team are between kids who are freshmen and kids who are seniors. It’s just been special, and I’ve been fortunate to be a part of it.”
Senior forward Avery Yagle can attest.
Yagle played right away as a freshman, scoring 10 goals during the 2022-23 school year.
Today, Yagle is the Rangers’ top-scoring threat with a team-leading 29 goals. She bagged back-to-back hat tricks, three goals in a single match, in wins over Porterville and Monache.
The Rangers routed the Panthers 10-0 on Jan. 26, and followed that with a 7-0 blanking of the Marauders two nights later.
With Yagle leading the way, Redwood clinched its fourth straight EYL championship after the Monache win.
In four seasons, the Rangers have yet to lose an EYL match and sport an undefeated 37-0-1 record with two league matches left to play this season.
How has Redwood been able to continue that success under Vieira?
“I think definitely just being consistent,” Yagle said. “He’s always there for us, personally, and everything. He has a really good coaching style, and he knows what he is doing, like, playing style and coaching style, and making sure we’re successful.”
As of Feb. 2, Redwood has won 13 straight matches. The Rangers’ only loss this season came to Hanford (13-2-2) in a 2-1 defeat in December.
Aside from that blemish, Redwood has dominated its opponents, outscoring them 96-11 despite playing most of its home matches at Mt. Whitney High School due to planning and installation of a new video scoreboard at Mineral King Bowl.
During that stretch of dominance, the Rangers have posted 12 shutouts, including seven in EYL competition behind the goalkeeping of junior Apple Espino (16 saves), sophomore Kenzlie Tisthammer (12 saves) and senior Mia Larsen (10 saves).
Redwood’s top offensive players this season are Yagle (29 goals, four assists), Ortiz (20 goals, eight assists) and senior winger Graycie Serpa (16 goals, 16 assists).
“We’re road warriors a little bit,” Vieira said. “It’s been tough because I really feel, especially for the seniors, playing at Mineral King Bowl is special, and it’s just a great atmosphere. For them not to get a lot of home matches in the bowl this year, it stinks, but it is what it is. We can only control what we can control, and that’s not something we can control, and they’ve had a great attitude about it. I told them, ‘This is our home this year. We have to defend this field whether we’re playing a playoff game, a league match, a non-league match. It really doesn’t matter.’ I do think that one of the things we’ve kind of been embracing is that road warrior mentality. We got out of the county a little bit and played up north. We played at the coast.
“Wherever we go, we’ve been able to represent Visalia well and Redwood well.”
That’s transformed Redwood into one of the nation’s elite programs, at least according to MaxPreps.com’s computer rankings.
In MaxPreps latest high school girls soccer rankings, the Rangers are ranked as the 23rd-best team in the state and 81st nationally. Redwood is No. 2 overall, behind Buchanan (18-0-1), in MaxPreps’ Central Section rankings.
Does that mean anything?
“I don’t really worry about the number that’s in front of the team,” Vieira said. “I worry about the number that is behind the team, and that’s, ‘What’s our record? What’s the score after the match?’ Whether we’re the second-best team or 20th-best team, I really don’t care. I know what I have here. The girls know this is a special group, and they know what they can achieve. Our goal at the end of the season is to be No. 1.”
This article originally appeared on Visalia Times-Delta: Why Redwood soccer is Tulare County’s premier girls program
Reporting by Vongni Yang, Visalia Times-Delta / Visalia Times-Delta
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
