She shoots and rarely misses. That’s why she’s The Bee’s girls soccer player of year
Pitman senior forward Isabella Shallou-Enes always looks for the best angle when she attempts a shot.
Most of the time, she finds it.
She had 90 goals in three years for the Pride.
But, just because she is trying to score doesn’t mean her focus is only on herself.
“Sometimes, if I know if I can get it into the back of the net and take a shot, I will,” Shallou-Enes said. “If someone else has a better position, I will give up the ball because at the end of the day, it’s a team effort and the goal is to get as many goals as possible.”
Shallou-Enes, who led the Pride (15-5-2, 7-2-1) to the second round of the CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Division I playoffs, is the Bee’s Girls Soccer Player of the Year.
For the most part, Shallou-Enes has always been a forward for much of her soccer life that began when she was little when her dad put a ball in front of her.
She would kick it around and eventually was put into a recreation soccer league.
Why did she always play the forward position?
It’s an easy answer.
“I love scoring goals,” Shallou-Enes said.
That was evident this season when she scored 27 for the talented Pitman team.
Some of them were easy, some were hard but a free kick against Gregori on Feb. 1 might have been her best.
Shallou-Enes was 10 meters outside the box and perfectly placed her kick over the Jaguars’ defenders and into the right corner of the net.
The technique she used for that attempt is the same idea she uses before every free kick.
“Depending on the angle and the wall, I always aim for the top of the head of the wall so that in my head, I won’t kick it over the net,” she said.
The success she had at Pitman led to a scholarship offer from San Jose State, where she is headed in the fall.
“The campus is really nice and I will be able to academically thrive (plan is to major in sports management or advertising),” she said.
She won’t the only local soccer player on the Spartans next year. She’ll be joined by Enochs senior Alison Gallant .
To get some team bonding before the season, the team was fundraising to potentially go to France this summer to watch the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup but the goal wasn’t attainable. So, Shallou-Enes will watch from home.
With two months left of high school, Shallou-Enes is going to enjoy her time and hang out with friends, go out to eat (Panda Express and Taco Bell are her favorites), and watch the latest Spongebob Squarepants episode or her favorite movie, Mamma Mia!.
