Bottom line is, Charlottesville’s Zoe Weatherford wanted in on the school’s field hockey team.
“I’ve seen the team since I was at CHS and they’re just such a great community and such a nice group of girls,” Weatherford said. “It just seemed like something I wanted to be a part of.”
Weatherford, a junior who’s been an all-district pick in girls soccer, joined the team this fall and the Black Knights are pretty happy she did. Monday night in a 3-2 victory over Orange County in Orange, she scored a critical goal while getting mowed down on an attempt at a stop by Orange’s keeper, Riley Clatterbuck.
“That’s Zoe, she’s fearless,” said Charlottesville coach Lindsay Larson. “Even if she’s not quite sure what she’s doing she lets her positive attitude (carry her) and she’s so tough that she’ll just get it done.”
The Black Knights built a 3-0 lead on the Hornets with an early first half goal by Katherine Webber plus back-to-back scores from Weatherford and Ellen Yates in the early stages of the second half. Charlottesville was particularly aggressive offensively, taking a clear step forward on that end of the field that the program has been searching for for awhile.
“This is the first time that our offense has won a game for us without the help of Kendall Ballard,” Larson said. “It has taken us two seasons to find some offense. Normally we rely on the defense to keep it close and we just try and sneak one in but tonight it was all our offense.”
Ballard, now a sophomore at Ohio University, was an offensive force unto herself, but this edition of the Black Knights is getting it done with a variety of players doing the damage.
Orange refused to go away though, taking things up a notch coming out of a timeout with a little more than 11 minutes to play. The first time the Hornets and Black Knights clashed, it was a one-goal win for CHS, and Orange knew they could hang in.
“I just had to keep instilling that into them,” said Orange coach Lauren Seal. “The scoreboard doesn’t matter, as long as you get one, it’s just going to push your momentum.”
Quite quickly out of that timeout, Abigail Yowell and Holli Foster put Orange within striking distance, scoring a pair of goals that gave Orange a chance down the stretch.
“Tonight they actually played two good halves,” Seal said. “To see them down three to nothing and scoring two goals in that little bit of time was very good to see.”
The Charlottesville defense held up though, giving the Black Knights a critical win and some momentum going into the postseason that starts next week.
The Black Knights will try and keep that momentum going at home against Louisa Tuesday while Orange travels to take on Monticello.
