Owensboro Catholic girls soccer is clicking on all cylinders, moving to 4-0 overall by blanking Daviess County 3-0.
The Lady Aces were controlling possession early, but just missed on a number of scoring opportunities.
Head Coach Andy Hines said that after playing some tough opponents over the weekend, the team showed that they were a little gassed.
“I think we were a little fatigued, but I think we still had that quality that we want to get to,” Hines said. “It’s coming off of two games this weekend you know, and both were physical games. So I think we started off a little slower than what I thought [we would].”
Owensboro Catholic did pick things up eventually, putting the first goal in the books in the 18th minute. A beautiful shot by Maddy Hayden well outside of the box just dropped over the goalie’s outstretched arms, giving them an early 1-0 lead.
The Lady Aces kept their foot on the gas, playing quick and physical to control the pace of play. This allowed them to grab another goal in the 33rd minute, this time with Mallary Bailey finding Virginia Young in the box to make it a 2-0 game.
Owensboro Catholic didn’t find the back of the net again until the 53rd minute, until Young struck again for her second goal of the night to take a 3-0 lead.
This lead was more than enough for the Lady Aces, grabbing yet another clean sheet to move to 4-0 overall.
This is the fourth straight game in which Owensboro Catholic hasn’t allowed a single goal, showing that its defense is in great form early on this season.
“I have no idea where that came from, but it’s been great,” Hines said. “Obviously Abby has been solid in goal and made some saves when we need her. Tonight she didn’t have to make too many big ones. And then Elle Brey is kind of stepping up with Rachel as a centerback partnership and I think they’re both doing a really good job.”
Despite being unable to get many shots on goal, Daviess County Head Coach David Sandifer was pleased with his team’s effort, but knows they’ve got some growing to do.
“I thought we played hard,” Sandifer said. “I thought we made a couple mistakes, especially the second goal and the third goal that could’ve been remedied… Our kids gave a good effort, but like I said we’ve gotta minimize the mistakes.”
Regardless, Sandifer said they had to tip his cap to Owensboro Catholic for their solid play over the course of the 80 minutes.
“Obviously Catholic played really well,” Sandifer said. “They moved well and they were really aggressive. They’re very athletic. They’ve got good team speed.”
Hines said that he felt that there were a lot of chances left on the table, but a lot of that came with being on the defense more or trying to make big moves with one pass.
“This game we were in their attacking half a lot more, so I didn’t think we had that quality there because we’d been working a lot on building out of the back,” Hines said. “So, those runs weren’t there and then even when we were building up and the midfield was open, we weren’t switching and were just kicking them long down the line.”
Owensboro Catholic will have a tough opponent in Evansville Mater Dei when they hit the road to take them on at 6 p.m. while Daviess County will have a busy weekend themselves, as they prepare to compete in the Smoky Mountain Cup starting Saturday.
