By Ryanne Riet | [email protected]

Brighton boys soccer took home the championship last season with hard work, great coaches, and good heads on their shoulders to thank.

Their season ended 18-1, with 62 goals scored and a +46-goal differential, leaving these boys walking away from their winning season with heads held high and an incredible amount of pride.

“Our success is a direct result of the culture that has been developed in our program,” Coach Brett Rosen said.

Ensuring that their priority is the whole team, with no one player as the focus, the Brighton boys soccer team encourages the success and achievement of one another as their own personal key to success.

“We support and encourage each other. We push each other,” Rosen said. “We don’t have captains on our team because I believe in a team leadership model where everyone on the team has the potential and the responsibility to lead.”

The encouragement and positive attitudes don’t stop on the champion varsity team’s field.

You can find the JV and varsity teams on the sidelines at most sophomore soccer games, cheering and offering encouragement to the players who will soon inherit their legacies.

As this year’s team turns their attention to the processes of success rather than the outcome, they are working hard each day to find themselves in a position that would make their predecessors proud.

“Winning a championship is difficult. We lost the best goalkeeper in the state of Utah, the 5A leading scorer, and a senior class full of talent and leadership,” Rosen said.

Facing two 6A teams in the preseason to ready themselves for the 2020 season, the Brighton boys soccer team has a bright future ahead of them.

With competitors nipping at their heels for a chance to claim UHSAA’s championship trophy in the 2020 season, the Brighton team is hard at work doing all they can to prepare and condition new players for the fight to come.

Other obstacles presented themselves to the Brighton boys soccer team as all games were halted for at least a period of a few weeks due to community precaution surrounding the coronavirus pandemic.

The team will continue keep their skills sharp as they wait for their season to resume.

It is unsure at this time if games missed during this period will be made up, or if they will finish the season a few games short.

With Rosen’s 20+ years of experience on and off the soccer field, he can give his team the tools to build skills that will benefit them on the field, in their growth as a team and in their growth as leaders.

Rosen was chosen as UHSAA’s 2019 Coach of the Year.

Only time will tell if the hard work, dedication and resilient mindsets of team and coaches will pay off at the end of the season.

“The process begins now and we will continue to improve throughout the year ready to peak in the playoffs,” Rosen said.