MONMOUTH — Give Kylie Kemp an inch and she’ll take a goal. Or two. And a bus ride to the next round of the playoffs.
Madison successfully employed two strategies to disarm Monmouth’s sniper for most of Tuesday afternoon: Mark her closely at times; leave her so alone at others that she couldn’t avoid stepping offside.
The latter gamble cost the No. 11 Bulldogs what had been a scoreless tie with 11:56 remaining in regulation. Kemp scored again less than seven minutes later to polish off the No. 3 Mustangs’ 2-0 Western Class C girls’ soccer quarterfinal win at Chick Field.
“Once (Sidney Wilson) went to pass me the ball and I saw it was offside, I had to run up and run back,” Kemp said. “I didn’t think I was going to get there, but I touched it before the goalie got it. The second goal I got lucky and got open.”
Monmouth (13-2) advanced to a weekend semifinal at No. 2 St. Dominic. Madison (7-9) backed up its preliminary-round road win at Dirigo with a performance that was a far cry from its 6-1 loss to Monmouth on Sept. 7.
“We played well in the first half, and on top of that we had the wind going with us and did everything but put one or two in,” Madison coach Mike Herrick said. “I thought that would have changed the game. They would have had to take chances instead of hanging in there and waiting for one.”
The Bulldogs spent roughly three-quarters of that first half in the Mustangs’ defensive zone, peppering Monmouth goalie Adriana Gonzalez with 10 shots. One hit the post. Multiple others veered just wide.
Even when Monmouth did make its runs past midfield, Madison junior Shelby Cutten’s smothering defense allowed Kemp precious little wiggle room.
Monmouth coach Gary Trafton said he was thankful the Mustangs didn’t trail 2-0 or 3-0 at the half.
“I think the wind in the second half might have helped a little bit, and we got the jitters out of the girls,” Trafton said. “I know they were nervous. (Madison) used that offside trap well on us. But thankfully you get caught on it I think.”
“We kind of had a little spat,” Kemp said of Monmouth’s halftime meeting. “We haven’t been coming out very well in the first half, and we talked about how we had to. We go over it in practice and we know we have to do it, but we don’t really understand it as much. But once you see it in the first half and really know what they’re doing, you have to change what you’re doing in order to play along with them.”
Madison’s 10-6 shots advantage in the first half flipped to a 10-2 Monmouth edge after intermission.
Wilson threaded the needle through the sagging Madison defenders to find a late-arriving Kemp for the first goal.
Caroline Bonenfant set up the insurance strike. After a change of possession in Madison’s defensive end, Kemp won a battle for the pass with Madison’s defender and fired a low line drive past Bulldogs keeper Savanna Kandiko inside the left post.
“It’s never comfortable being that close. Once you get one goal it really helps, and then if you get a second goal it makes it a lot easier when we’re ahead,” Kemp said.
“That first one that was huge just to kind of get the monkey off our back. I kind of thought we were going into overtime. Some girls stepped up today,” Trafton added, citing the work of Bonenfant, Ashley Coulombe and Sammy Grandahl. “Everybody played their parts today. It’s not the Kylie Show. Kylie does a lot for us, but we have to get the ball to her and it takes a lot of people to get it to her.”
Kandiko made 12 saves, including two straight in a perilous sequence directly in front of the cage to keep it scoreless midway through the second half.
“A player like (Kemp) we can shut her out all game, and she gets one opportunity or two opportunities to show why she’s a special player,” Herrick said.
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