Ocoee High soccer finds its footing

When Ocoee’s boys soccer program takes to the field, things feel different.

The players are confident but not arrogant, and the passes and style of play all feels natural — like the team has been playing together for 10 years.

During the Knights’ game against Lake Minneola Friday, Jan. 10, the team’s cohesiveness was on full display. Ocoee sliced apart the Hawks’ defense — putting up five goals to Lake Minneola’s one. 

The win moved the Knights to 9-3-2 on a season that has been a renaissance of sorts for the program, and it’s all because of the players’ camaraderie and discipline, head coach Peter Moore said.

“They’re friends, they have a good time together, they joke around and they show respect,” Moore said. “I can make some changes, and the players just listen to what I’m saying. 

“We have a pretty simple rule that we shake hands whenever we see each other,” he said. “And these kids do it — you don’t even have to say a word. They come to my class or someone else’s class, and they’re shaking your hand as they’re coming through the door and showing respect. This is a special group.”

Moore has seen some special teams — including one that made the state semis — since he joined in 2005, Ocoee High’s first year. During the early years of Moore’s tenure, he had guys who played at the high school and club levels. Then, years of losing seasons came along, before the program finally got things together last season.

Despite ending last year with a loss at the hands of West Orange in the district semifinal, the Knights finished with a 9-5-3 record, the program’s first season above .500 since 2014-15.

The immense change has been propelled by dedication as much as anything, senior defender Zachary Ballard said.

“It’s just weeding out the bad players — the people who aren’t fully committed and (who) don’t want to show up and get better,” he said. “We want to come so we can all work hard and get better together — not just skill-wise, but as a team and a whole. We want to show up to practice, put in everything and work as hard as we can.”

Coming into the 2019-20 season, the Knights only lost a couple of players while returning a majority of the team. This year, the Knights are loaded with seniors and juniors.

With that kind of leadership in place, senior defender Parker Green knows this could be a big year.

“I just feel like we had a little bit of the mentality that, ‘OK, we have a good side to kind of build around,’ then we chose the players we felt fit in best,” Green said. “Just being an older team, having those returners coming back, putting in that extra work helps us get to where we are now.”

The Knights are sitting as one of the best teams in the area, thanks to key players such as senior forwards Jean Forestal and Stenson Armand, who have led the Knights to nine wins so far this season — including big victories over Bishop Moore (15-3) and Montverde (8-1) — while picking up ties with West Orange and Dr. Phillips.

With four games left before the district tournament, the Knights won’t have time to rest. For the team’s seven seniors, this is it — one last chance to make an impression and leave a legacy.

“I know for Parker and (me) — we have played club soccer and rec soccer for a really long time, so it’s kind of our last year to play — we would really like to go out with a bang and hopefully be district champions or maybe more,” Ballard said. “(We) just want something good to look back at for our last year.”