WALES — Oak Hill and Hall-Dale were deadlocked in a scoreless battle heading into the final minutes of their MVC girls’ soccer game Tuesday.
Then the game came down to situational soccer. The host Raiders took advantage of their late opportunity and converted the lone goal of the game with 2:11 left in a 1-0 win at Fairchild Field.
Charlotte Waterman took a corner kick to the left of the goal, then was ready to kick again when the rebound came back out to her. Her second boot lifted over a crowded box and into the back of the net.
“We always practice if it pops back out to get it back to the person that’s taking the corner, or even on the flip throw-in,” Waterman said. “We try to pop it back out to her because we have that angle to cross it back in. It’s almost like a re-do corner kick. I just saw the angle and took it.
“It had that feeling off my foot.”
“Corner kicks is one of those things that we’re constantly working on, and to see that ball come right back to (Charlotte), and her have a shot from there, I think her expression on her face says it all,” Oak Hill coach Jeremy Young added.
The lone let-in spoiled an otherwise positive performance from the Bulldogs (1-5-1), who played “some of the best soccer we’ve played this year,” according to head coach Guy Cousins.
“We played 78 minutes of really strong soccer, and we’ve not been able to put those many minutes together in one game,” Cousins added.
While the Raiders (5-1-1) successfully implemented their game plan on the game-winning corner kick, the Bulldogs slipped up on their strategy just enough to allow Oak Hill a rare scoring chance.
“When the ball’s on the outside we try to close the space down, and we didn’t close it down quick enough,” Cousins said. “Even though it went back to her, if we would have closed the space and contained it a little bit more, that shot wouldn’t have happened.”
Hall-Dale had two prime chances to score 10 minutes before Waterman’s winner. Sabrina Freeman got a look at the goal with Raiders goalie Anna Dodge behind her, but defender Julia Ahlberg swooped in to stymie the shot.
Freeman drew a penalty kick seconds later going after the rebound. Addie Davis took the kick but Dodge scooped up the straight-ahead shot.
“Any time you get a non-goalie save, from Julia Ahlberg, you can’t ask for more than that,” Young said. “And then the PK save from Anna Dodge.
“Anna’s repeatedly huge in games for us.”
Waterman said the two standout plays from the defense were enough to wake up the Raiders’ attack.
It was an attack that was put to rest through nearly 78 minutes by a stout Hall-Dale defense, which made quality shots against goalie Maggie Gross a rare occurrence.
“We challenged really well,” Cousins said. “They did very well shutting down the ball, containing the attack, forcing it to the outside.
“I thought we defended incredibly well with our back four.”
“They certainly made sure, numbers-wise, to get back on defense,” Young said. “We play, a lot of times, with two forwards. There’s only so much we can do at times, 2-on-4 or 2-on-5 or 2-on-6 when they start to bring it back and take care of that. They certainly did their job on defense.”
The underdog Bulldogs did all they could to earn either a win or a tie, but in the end one last chance was all the Raiders needed.
“This was our homecoming game, so we knew it was a pretty big game for us,” Waterman said.
wkramlich@sunjournal.com
Send questions/comments to the editors.
