After a 2022 season that saw Alvirne’s girls’ soccer team host a playoff game as the eighth seed in Division I, the team found themselves in a rough patch in 2023, between graduating numerous strong athletes including Paige Boudreau, Paige McKinley, Lyla Davis, Mallory Busnach, and so many others, as well as an injury to Alekhya Buddhiraju, who tore her ACL before the season began, costing Alvirne their best player for the season.
Alvirne is coming off an 0-15-1 season in which not much went right, but the team is hoping for a bounce-back year in 2024. The Lady Broncos will open their season on August 29 against Dover at home. Kickoff for that game is scheduled for 5:30 PM at Alvirne. Dover is coming off a year that saw them going 3-12-1, so that should be a competitive matchup right out of the gate, as Dover only beat Alvirne 2-1 last season in a game that also took place at Alvirne.
Alvirne will then turn around in their second week of play and face off against the defending state champion Timberlane Owls in their next game, that one being in Plaistow against the Owls on Tuesday, September 3 before coming back home to host the Salem Blue Devils, who were a .500 team last season with a record of 7-7-3.
The following week, the Broncos will have a back-to-back with their first game of the week being on the road against Nashua South on the 11th at Stellos Stadium in Nashua and their second game being on the 12th against last year’s runners-up-the Portsmouth Clippers. The Panthers were a 7-9-1 team a year ago that the Broncos battled to a narrow 3-1 defeat a year ago.
From there, Alvirne will host the Windham Jaguars on Tuesday the 17th in a game that, if last season’s matchup was any indication for this year, could also be very competitive, as Alvirne only lost by two against the 6-9-1 Jaguars a year ago. Alvirne will also have a game against Bishop Guertin in Nashua on Saturday that week.
The final week of September will see the Lady Broncos take on Concord and Pinkerton to wrap up the month. Both schools that have traditionally good programs with last year being no exception as Concord went 12-3-1 in the regular season and Pinkerton went 8-5-3, both teams falling in the quarterfinal round.
Turning the calendar to October, Alvirne will take on Merrimack on October 1 at home, and then have a few days off before traveling to Exeter to take on the Blue Hawks on Saturday the 5th, with their Saturday game kicking off at 11:00 in the morning, which is a rather difficult kickoff time for a game all the way out in Exeter.
The Broncos will get some time to recuperate after the Exeter game, however, as they won’t play until Thursday, October 10 at home against Manchester Central before they travel to Stellos Stadium for a third time this season to take on the Nashua North Titans at 10:00 in the morning on Saturday the 12th.
In their final full week of the regular season, Alvirne will take on Winnacunnet on the road to open up the week on Tuesday and then return home for their final home game of the year against Spaulding on Thursday the 17th of October. Alvirne’s final game of the regular season will be on the road, as they will take a ride up to Manchester to take on the Manchester Memorial Crusaders.
Looking at their schedule, and the projected roster for 2024, Alvirne will likely take a step in the right direction this year, potentially making a run at one of the final playoff bids, or at least being a pesky team that can steal games from contenders, if nothing else. If there is one thing last year showed people who followed the NHIAA, and Alvirne sports in general, it was that anything can happen on any given night. That being said, when it comes to a record prediction for the Broncos, conservatively, they could realistically go somewhere in the neighborhood of 6-9-1, with a ceiling of 8-8 and a floor of 4-12.
