EDMONDS — Last Thursday against Arlington, the Edmonds-Woodway girls soccer team broke a scoreless tie in the 78th minute to defeat the Eagles.
Apparently that victory wasn’t thrilling enough.
The Warriors outdid themselves on Tuesday, scoring a goal in the 80th minute to defeat Wesco 3A rival Shorecrest 2-1.
“We were starting to figure it out and we finally found a way to break it down and be at the right place at the right time,” Edmonds-Woodway head coach Bill LeCompte said after his team’s victory. “That’s hands down probably the best team we’re going to see this year and to be able to come out on top, that’s huge.”
The Warriors are the defending 3A state champion, while Shorecrest was the 2A state runner-up last season. Both schools lost several key players from those teams, but both are still considered two of the favorites in the Wesco 3A this season.
Shorecrest got on the scoreboard first, scoring in the sixth minute on a free kick by senior midfielder Alexa Iacolucci. Iacolucci’s kick, which was from about 35 yards out, hit Edmonds-Woodway goalkeeper Hannah Hicks’ hands, but bounced off the crossbar and off her back and into the goal for the Scots.
It was an unfortunate result for an otherwise perfect Hicks.
“It bounces off the post and hits her in the back, how do you defend that?” LeCompte said. “She’s just getting more and more confidence in there and we’re playing more and more confident defensively in front of her.”
Iacolucci’s goal was the only scoring in the first half that was dominated by the Scots. Shorecrest’s dominance continued early in the second half, but the Warriors slowly seized momentum in the game’s final 40 minutes.
Senior forward Gabby Clark got her team on the board in the 48th minute, taking a throughball from junior Ellie Shull and beating Shorecrest goalkeeper Kate Wiper for the equalizer. The goal sparked the Warriors, who controlled possession for most of the remainder of the game.
“I challenged them at halftime to step out on the field and take it back and try to figure out how to play our game,” LeCompte said. “It took a little while to get into it in the second half, but after 10 or 15 minutes we really started to come on.”
The game looked as though it was headed to overtime, until Shull broke away from the defense on the right side of the field in the 80th minute. She delivered a cross to senior midfielder Haley Tschohl, who beat Wiper with a shot to the lower-left portion of the goal.
“We didn’t take care of our opportunities,” Shorecrest head coach Mindy Dalziel said. “They countered really quickly and we were so pushing forward and trying to take of possession and keep the ball that we just got completely defensively out of whack. It was frustrating.”
After a game where the Scots controlled most of the possession, had more corner kicks and more shots on goal, it took just one Edmonds-Woodway possession to let all that work slip away.
“I saw it happen,” Dalziel said. “I was like, ‘look a backdoor run, oops there’s a goal.’
“We played so well and we possessed the ball so well, we just didn’t pull the trigger when we needed to.”
Aaron Lommers covers prep sports for The Herald. Follow him on Twitter at @aaronlommers and contact him at alommers@heraldnet.com.
At Edmonds Stadium
Goals–Alexa Iacolucci (S), Gabby Clark (E-W), Haley Tschohl (E-W). Assists–Ellie Shull (E-W) 2. Goalkeepers–Shorecrest: Kate Wiper. Edmonds-Woodway: Hannah Hicks. Records–Shorecrest 1-1-0 league, 4-1-1 overall. Edmonds-Woodway 2-0-0, 4-1-1.
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