High school soccer: Brighton, Mountain View still tops in state

Heading into the 2010 boys soccer season, a plethora of talented teams from around the state all hope to show everyone else what they can do this spring.

But for all the quality that's out there — and there's a ton of it scattered throughout Utah — two schools currently overshadow everyone else: Brighton and Mountain View.

Both Brighton and Mountain View convincingly won state championships in their respective classifications last year with junior-laden teams, and now they're back to try to achieve even more glory this year.

Perhaps the only disappointing thing is that those schools won't face each other in a head-to-head matchup. However, both Brighton and Mountain View will repeatedly have to take the best shots that the rest of the state has to offer, and seeing how they fare should be extremely fun to watch.

With a week of play in the books for 2A and 3A schools and two weeks of play in the books for 4A and 5A schools, here's a classification-by-classification look around the state:

CLASS 5A: Right now, it certainly seems as though a whole bunch of teams could eventually make it to Rio Tinto Stadium to play for the championship in this classification.

But everyone knows who the favorite is.

How could you possibly not be the favorite when your program is one of the most tradition-laden in the state, has won the state's largest classification twice in a row and returns some of the more talented players in state history?

Brighton coach Russ Boyer does a terrific job of never letting his players look past anything other than the match that's in front of them, and the Bengals will undoubtedly get an opponent's best game every time they step on the pitch over the course of the next three months.

Nonetheless, you have to consider Brighton's group of players to be the big 5A favorite right now.

Returning 5A MVP Austin Nate and defender Jordan Hatanaka were both fantastic last year for Brighton, and they're surrounded by outstanding players, including Thomas Loomis and Taylor Peay, just to name a couple.

Beneath Brighton, Copper Hills, Davis, Viewmont and Alta should all be outstanding sides this year, and there are others who could make it up to or near the top.

CLASS 4A: Before last year, a lot of people believed that 2010 would be the year for Mountain View soccer, the year when the Bruins finally broke through to win a state championship with a senior-laden team.