Soccer Game Preview: Varela vs. North Miami

The Varela Vipers will square off against the North Miami Pioneers at 3:30 p.m. on Friday.

Wednesday just wasn't the day for Varela's offense. They lost 8-0 to Gulliver Prep last Wednesday. While losing is never fun, the Vipers can't take it too hard given the team's big disadvantage in MaxPreps' Florida soccer rankings (they are ranked 258th, while the Raiders are ranked 77th).

Meanwhile, it can be hard to translate regular season success to the playoffs, but North Miami had no problem doing just that on Wednesday. Their defense stepped up to hand the Patriots a 3-0 shutout. The Pioneers better thank their lucky stars for the performance of Thomas Christelle, as she scored every single goal for her team.

The victory was the third in a row for North Miami, bringing their record for this year to 7-8-2. Those victories came thanks to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they scored 11 goals over those three games. As for Varela, this is the second loss in a row for them and nudges their season record down to 10-6-1.

Varela came out on top in a nail-biter against North Miami when the teams last played back in November of 2022, sneaking past 2-1. The rematch might be a little tougher for Varela since the team won't have the home-pitch advantage this time around. We'll see if the change in venue makes a difference.