In 2019 and 2020, the Ogden High girls soccer team went to the 4A state championship game with teams that had a bunch of seniors and experienced players.

By the time the 2021 team got together for preseason practice, enough players had graduated to where the 2021 group was the first in a few years to have so many new faces in the starting lineup — seven new starters out of 11 positions.

In the end, inexperience didn’t seem to be a hindrance.

For the second time in three years, Ogden High girls soccer won a state championship, beating Morgan High 1-0 back on Oct. 23.

The Tigers are the 2021 Standard-Examiner All-Area Girls Soccer Team of the Year.

“I knew we had talent, I knew we had good work ethic and things like that, we just kind of had an unproven depth chart in terms of playing a lot of varsity time,” OHS coach Ryan Robinson said about the team’s prospects over the summer.

The Tigers started 3-3 heading into Region 13 play — three of those first six games went to extra time — as the inexperienced team grew up quickly.

Robinson said he played a few starting lineups and about 22 girls had significant varsity time throughout the season so he and his coaches could get a read on what player combinations worked well together.

Most of Ogden’s inexperience, save for senior defender Sae Obayashi, was in defense.

That same defense ended up registering 12 shutouts, allowing 15 goals in 20 games and played a huge role in securing the Tigers’ fourth state title in school history (2001, 2011, 2019, 2021).

With a 1-0 lead following midfielder Neveah Peregrina’s dipping goal from the corner, Tigers sophomore goalkeeper Emily Blackford saved a Morgan penalty kick that would’ve tied the title game with about 10 minutes left.

Blackford made another “three saves that should’ve been goals” throughout that game, Robinson said.

The margins in that Oct. 23 meeting were pretty slim. If the ball flies a little differently in some spots — Peregrina’s goal and Blackford’s penalty save just to name two — then the Trojans, who had an even younger team than Ogden, probably win.

“I’m guessing we could play that game 10 times and it’s a 5-5 split or 6-4,” Robinson said. “You prepare, work hard and hope that on that it’s enough to come out in your favor.”

Though Ogden dropped from 4A to 3A this year, the state title game was just as difficult because it was the third meeting against Morgan. The two teams split the regular-season series and the Region 13 championship with it.

Both teams knew each other pretty well, not to mention the players who played club soccer with and against each other.

Speaking in the aftermath of the state title game, Peregrina said the focus for the 2021 title game was for the Tigers to come out, “take shots” and not be quiet on the bus ride to Rio Tinto Stadium like they were in 2020 before the loss to Ridgeline.

“On the bus ride this time, we had music playing, we had everyone talking. We made sure we changed it this year,” Peregrina said after the game.

Up front, Peregrina and forward Tori Kalista were the two most active players for the Tigers.

Peregrina, a sophomore, is a playmaking midfielder who was good enough to start (and play well) as a freshman and now draws a lot of defensive attention.

Tori Kalista is a forward who led the team in scoring for two straight seasons, according to MaxPreps, and was a player who could create scoring chances out of thin air.

Those two get most of the recognition and “rightly so,” Robinson said, but he emphasized Ogden had a deep and strong team.

“The team really has a lot of unsung, unrecognized girls that are just willing to make the pass to Neveah or the next pass to Tori, people like (senior forward) Grace Pulley don’t get a lot of ink,” he said.

With three straight seasons getting to the state title game and a host of alumni playing at the college level, Ogden is becoming more known in soccer circles as a team to keep an eye on each year.

There’s plenty of talent in the Tigers’ program, obviously, but Robinson said there’s a cultural aspect of things that goes back to the early 2000s, spanning a handful of different head coaches.

“One thing that’s been consistent that entire time is something that’s permeated the whole program which I think makes a big difference: they have this cheer at the end of practice, ‘Every day, every way, get a little better,'” Robinson said. “If we just get better every day, we’re good. And before you know it, you’re in the state finals.”

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