Edmonds-Woodway wins 5th straight, beats Stanwood 4-0

Published 9:44 pm Tuesday, October 14, 2014

STANWOOD — Edmonds-Woodway’s girls soccer team scored just six goals in its first six games this season.

The Warriors, now with 11 matches behind them, have fared much better of late. On Tuesday, they defeated Stanwood 4-0 in a Wesco 3A match, increasing their goal total for the past five games to 24. The victory also was Edmonds-Woodway’s fifth consecutive — all of which have been league contests.

“It’s just keeping the momentum that we’ve had,” Edmonds-Woodway head coach Bill LeCompte said of his team’s victory. “We’ve been doing well. We’ve been finding the net. I think that’s the biggest thing is we finally started finding the net. Just continue to find that relaxed approach and playing the way we want to play.”

Edmonds-Woodway (5-2 league, 8-3 overall) put the pressure on the Spartans early, with the Warriors first shot rolling just outside the Stanwood goal in the third minute. Rylee Peterson found the back of the net in the 16th minute for Edmonds-Woodway, with a strike from about 35 yards away from the goal.

After the ball bounced around between Peterson and a few Stanwood defenders, the senior forward took control, spun and scored.

Peterson added a second goal for the Warriors in the 51st minute. Edmonds-Woodway junior Ashleigh Fonsen sent a corner kick into the box that landed at the feet of Peterson, stationed at the far post. She sent the ball past the Stanwood goalkeeper to double the Warriors’ lead.

“She’s been huge this season. She’s been huge for the last four years,” LeCompte said of the senior. “She’s a very, very good player. A great person and a great leader on the field. To have her find the net tonight is a good thing, especially when everybody thinks that they can key in on someone else.”

That someone else LeCompte was referring to is star forward Madison Schultz, who scored for Edmonds-Woodway in the 64th minute.

Fonsen’s added a free kick from about 27 yards that just barely snuck in the net to cap the scoring for Edmonds-Woodway.

“We focused on just trying to retool the formation and the way we were attacking early on to give us some opportunities,” LeCompte said. “As the second half went on, we started to play the style we wanted to play and the formation we were running gave us opportunities.”

Stanwood freshman Espy Sanchez had Stanwood’s first real scoring opportunity, but her shot in the 37th minute was stopped by a collision with diving Edmonds-Woodway goalkeeper Kiera Towell, who slid right at the Stanwood forward.

The Spartans (5-2-1, 6-2-2) had another chance late in the game, when junior Camryn Cross kicked a slow roller that Towell was just able to get a hand on and redirect out of the net in the 76th minute. Cross almost scored again on the subsequent corner kick, but the header just missed the net.

“We just weren’t able to connect our passes,” Stanwood head coach Lori Stunz said. “We weren’t playing the game that we know that we can play. I think we went in a little bit scared knowing what they’ve done to other opponents in our league.”

LeCompte had high praise for the Spartans, a team he said ranked among the best in the 13-team Wesco 3A.

“I think that they’re a bit better than the last time we saw them a few years back,” said LeCompte, whose Warriors are in the 3A classification after moving down prior to the season. “They can give anybody fits. I think that’s the big difference tonight is we kind of had an idea of what we needed to do. Stanwood’s definitely one of the top four teams that we’ve seen in the conference.”

Stunz said her Spartans will learn from Tuesday night’s loss, but also will try to quickly put it in the past.

“That’s what I told the girls after the game was the fact that they needed to learn from this and move forward,” Stunz said. “We’re not going to match up with weak teams in the playoffs. We’re going to match up with Edmonds-Woodways or an Arlington or a Shorecrest. We’ve got to step in on the field and put in the full 80 minutes.”

At Bob Larson Stadium, Stanwood

Goals–Rylee Peterson (E-W) 2, Madison Schultz (E-W), Ashleigh Fonsen (E-W). Assists–Gabby Clark (E-W), Fonsen (E-W), Alison Monroe (E-W). Goalkeepers–Edmonds-Woodway: Kiera Towell. Stanwood: Kaitlin Larson, Jordynn Perkins. Records–Edmonds-Woodway 5-2 league, 8-3 overall. Stanwood 5-2-1, 6-2-2.