The Lakeside Blue Ridge Yellow Jackets continued their run through the state by outscoring opponents 30-0 at the Old Pueblo Soccer Classic held at Udall Park in Tucson. Hosted by Desert Christian, seven of the current top ten teams in the state took part including No. 2 Blue Ridge, No. 3 Camp Verde, No. 4 Chino Valley, No. 5 Willcox, No. 6 Page, No. 8 Benson and No. 9 Snowflake.

Blue Ridge is 12-0 overall, 8-0 in power-ranking matches and 5-0 in the 2A East Region and is slated to play at No. 1 Phoenix Country Day (7-0) on Thursday, Oct. 4. Phoenix Country Day beat Blue Ridge 2-1 (PK 4-3) in the 2A state championship last fall.

As a team, the Yellow Jackets have scored an incredible 104 goals which works out to about 6 goals an outing while only giving up .75 goals a game. Sophomore keeper Andy Plath has 30 saves on the year and most of the scoring has come from junior forward Tommy Pederson.

Pederson scored 12 of his 51 goals at the Old Pueblo Classic, putting him in second place in the country behind Diego Camarena of Gilman, Illinois. Camarena has 52 goals on the year.

“Our midfield passes really well and they really open up the field to give our strikers opportunities,” Pederson said. “We lost state last year and it really motivated me. A week after state I just started grinding on soccer every single day after school and my coach helped me out, just playing one versus one practices and I worked on my touches and finishing and it honestly brought my game up to a whole new level.”

Pederson scored 20 goals as a sophomore to compliment the 23 recorded by graduated senior Omar Esparza. The 2017 2A runner-up team finished the year with 118 goals but that included goals scored in the playoffs.

The Yellow Jackets have taken second place five years in a row now after winning four in a row from 2009 to 2012. In all, the Yellow Jackets have played in 16 championship matches dating back to 1986, winning nine of them. Current head coach Bryon Crain has three state titles and former coach Richard Breckenridge had the first six.

The Desert Christian Eagles have two titles to their name. The team beat Blue Ridge in 1996 and 1997 and the Eagles have since been to five more title matches but have come up empty with the last attempt coming in a 2-0 loss to Blue Ridge in 2012.

Division II soccer is a coed-division for schools unable to field a boys and a girls team and Desert Christian discontinued their girl’s program after the 2015 season. There are no Southern Arizona teams playing D-II girls soccer.