Monroe offense comes up empty

Published 11:42 pm Saturday, November 14, 2009

ISSAQUAH — The Issaquah girls soccer team did not have its normal audience, hosting the 4A quarterfinal game against Monroe.

Many Eagles fans including most of the student section was in Everett for the football team’s 48-28 victory over Jackson.

Eagles faithful would have been just as happy with the result at Issaquah High School Stadium as the home team rolled to a 4-0 victory that ended Monroe’s season Saturday night.

The Monroe offense disappeared after shocking Emerald Ridge with a 5-1 win Tuesday.

“It stings a little bit,” Monroe coach Kathleen Potthast said. “We played great at Emerald Ridge and I think we left most of it at Emerald Ridge.”

Entering the 2009 campaign no one would have guessed that the Bearcats would have been the final Wesco team standing in either the 3A or 4A tournament. With Everett and Jackson entering as favorites to win their respective classifications, Monroe — a team with just three seniors — was an afterthought. Glacier Peak, a 2-1 loser to Mercer Island Saturday afternoon, was the other Wesco team in the quarterfinals.

“No one expected Monroe to be here,” Potthast said. “It’s really special for us to come this far.”

Issaquah (16-2-0) Advances to the state semifinals at Harry Lang Stadium in Lakewood where it will take on Kamiakin (18-1-1) a 2-1 winner in a shootout over Lewis &Clark Friday night.

The biggest performance on the night came from the smallest player on the field.

Issaquah’s Audrey Thomas — all 4 feet 11 and a half inches of her — scored the first two goals of the game and her first two of the season.

“In the last six games she’s been getting closer to a goal,” Issaquah coach Tom Bunnell said. “I kept telling her she was going to score one that would send us to the next level.”

Thomas delivered in the 23rd minute with a header that was assisted by Kristin Maris. Ten minutes later the Eagles lined up for one of their seven first-half corner kicks and Kelsey Ford deflected the ball in traffic to Thomas, who popped up a shot just over the head of a Bearcat defender guarding the far post.

“I’m so excited,” Thomas said, “Goals don’t come that easy.”

The freshman added that at the beginning of the season she didn’t even expect to be on the team let alone scoring the deciding goals in a state tournament game.

The Bearcat offense was stalemated in the first half and got virtually zero penetration until the final minute when it earned a corner kick. Senior Kaitlynn Chesemore served up a brilliant bender and Alyssa Drew met the ball with her head but the ball caromed off the crossbar a few seconds before the half expired.

“That would have made a difference,” Potthast said. “We could have come out of the half different mentally.”

Issaquah keeper Brooke Miller recorded her eighth shutout of the season and needed just two saves to do so.

Senior Lindsay Stoll recorded the final two goals of the game in the 53rd and 63rd minutes. The second came from a free kick off the foot of Abby Glasgow who set up Stoll with a header that squirted past Monroe’s Dani Philippart in goal.

Potthast has high hopes for the 2010 Bearcats, but it is the end of the line for Chesemore, Whitney Siler and Janelle Davis, who all played their final game Saturday.

“I had these three since they were freshman and it’s sad to see them go,” Potthast said. “Their leadership was huge.”