The defending state champion Toll Gate girls soccer team picked up right where it left off last season by winning its first four games including two league matches.

The Titans graduated 13 seniors from last year’s championship group but return a crop of players that are familiar with battling through adversity. Three of the team’s top performers were lost for the season due to injury in 2022, seemingly sinking its title odds. Toll Gate didn’t blink and went on to win its second championship in three years.

Toll Gate’s most recent victory came against Classical on the road on Tuesday in a 3-1 decision. The team also picked up a big win over St. Ray’s the game before.

Sophomore Shinyu Vega has jumped out to a big start, currently leading the team with three goals while Katie Pale and Adeline Areson have each netted a pair each. Alanna Pereira returns in net and has allowed just four goals overall, while other key players include Emily Vigneault, Anna Pickering, Isabelle LaFontaine, Grace Holdridge and Jadyn Moore.

“Our goal is to make the playoffs, whether it is the last seed, middle seed, whatever. We just want to get there and be ready to make a run,” said Bob Enright, who returns for his fourth season as the team’s head coach.

Although the preseason was a struggle at times, according to Enright, he feels that the team is finally beginning to find answers within its roster and has used last year’s roller coaster of a season to its advantage.

“Last year we were down before the season even started losing three of our best players, three starters. I tried to tell them, ‘next man up,’ as cliché as that is. But they bought in, everyone had a role, everyone contributed from JV on up,” said Enright. “We had good practices and the team now believes that we can do this no matter what happens, even if we lose quality players. The girls having that knowledge, they’re resilient now.”

Toll Gate will have some big divisional games coming up in the next week, including Thursday night’s matchup against Narragansett and next week’s game against Westerly, who they beat in the finals last fall.

As the Titans continue to gel, Enright hopes they continue to make steady progress and put themselves in a position to make another deep run by regular season’s end.

“Westerly is strong and will be there, Narragansett is off to a good start. The same teams are going to be up at the top fighting for spots. I hope we’re one of those teams but our primary goal is to just get in and see what happens,” said Enright.