Cañada College women’s soccer retooled and ready for ’22

“Our area is so super saturated, we’re five schools 10 miles apart,” Osborne said. “You’d think because of the COVID year I should have had a ton of girls. And I finished with 14 girls.”

The sparse roster didn’t prevent Osborne from leading her Colts to the playoffs for the seventh consecutive season. Despite playing in the Coast Conference North along with eventual state champion Hartnell College, Cañada fought its way into the 18-team Northern California postseason field as the No. 16 seed, earning a 4-1 win over No. 17 Yuba in the play-in round before being eliminated by Hartnell in a 2-0 loss.

“Quite honestly, we played really well,” Osborne said. “We had some balls hitting the post. I was really happy with it. I was pretty proud of the group.”

Entering 2022 — with the non-conference season opener slated for Saturday, Aug. 27 at home against West Valley at 11 a.m. — the Colts will be forced to reinvent their frontline attack. Reinventing, though, is one of Osborne’s fortes.

“Really, it’s the recruiting end of it,” Osborne said of the key to Cañada’s success. “Bringing in the right pieces of the larger team puzzle. And every year I’ve had big goal scorers.”

Orthbandt transferred after her athletic freshman campaign. Having finished her associate degree, she signed a transfer admission guarantee last year, and is slated to play at UC Santa Barbara this season. Honde Reyes has transferred to Menlo College, where she will be playing on an athletic scholarship this season.

So, Osborne dug into the Woodside front row by recruiting a standout forward from the neighboring Wildcats. No, not that standout forward — Elise Evans, now at Stanford, who nabbed Gatorade California Girls’ Soccer Player of the Year — but Cañada landed Evans’ front-row counterpart in Rachel Mull, along with another Woodside grad in midfielder Giselle Gutierrez.

The Woodside tandem will join the anchor of the Colts lineup, sophomore midfielder Yara Gomez-Zavala.

“We lost Kyla, so I was looking to fill some offensive spots, and I think I’ve done that,” Osborne said.

The Colts filled in some defensive spots as well, and in quite a sisterly way. Osborne recruited two sets of sisters, including twins Mia and Shayla McCann out of Terra Nova. And while not twins, Maddie and Natalie Mandolado out of Milpitas are also on roster. All four are in the mx as starting defenders.

The Colts have experience in goal, with sophomore goalkeeper Jenna Vath returning to take over fulltime in the cage. Last season, Vath earned a majority of the playing time in goal, but still split time with Kimberly Gonzalez, who is now attending San Jose State academically.

And while Cañada doesn’t figure to continue its long line of powerhouse scorers — Sulma Plancarte in 2019 ranked sixth in the state with 26 goals; Alex Augulis in 2018 ranked seventh with 25 goals, and in 2017 was 11th with 21; and Brady Candaele in 2015 ranked eighth with 21 goals — the return of some semblance of depth has Osborne content with a sum-of-its-parts approach.

“There isn’t someone I would say I have tagged like that this year,” Osborne said. “But overall, I think I have more of a distribution of talent.”

While the 2022 season doesn’t open until next Saturday, Cañada hosts a friendly this Friday, Aug. 19, against the Silicon Valley Soccer Academy Palo Alto club at 5:45 p.m.