When this season started, Boys Soccer coach Curt Wullschleger knew he had a chance to have a special team.

Plenty of experienced players returned and the boys were hungry from a disappointing finish last season.

But not even Wullschleger could have predicted the type of season the team is having.

After a 5-0 win over Southeast in the first round of the Class 6A playoffs, North has improved its record to 14-3. They await the winner of Campus vs. West.

The most impressive part of their record is that the team has held opponents scoreless for the last nine games.

“The team is special defensively because of experience,” Wullschleger said. “Our starting back four are all returning starters from last year. They have an understanding between one another that can come only from being match tested.”

Wullschleger describes his team as strong, physical and fast. Depth has also played a key role as well. All of these factors give Wullschleger confidence that this team has what it takes to make a deep playoff run.

“We are deep,” Wullschleger said. “We are stacked at every position. We can rotate fresh players all game long which keeps our pace of play at a very high level. There is no drop off when substitutes come into the game.”

As impressive as the defense has been pitching nine straight shutouts, the offense is performing at a high level. During that same span, North has scored 38 goals.

“Our decision making with the ball has been intelligent and mature,” Wullschleger said. “We have managed to avoid costly mistakes since the end of September.”

The Redskins have a balanced attack, with 18 players having scored at least one goal. A’llec Medina leads the team with 11 goals, and Alejandro Orona leads with 7 assists.

“I love coaching this team because we have fun,” Wullschleger said. “At the end of every pre-game speech, I remind the players to have fun out there. When we’re enjoying our soccer, that’s when we play our best.”