After beating Salem, a Group 4A finalist in 2016 on Tuesday, Western Albemarle’s girls soccer team knew they couldn’t take district foe Monticello lightly. Not with the Mustangs’ stingy defense coming to Crozet.
But in another solid performance, the Warriors shut out Monticello and picked up a 3-0 victory despite not finishing as much as they’d like.
“It always gets a little frustrating when you can’t find the back of the net as many times (as you’d like) but when the chances are there, you don’t have much to complain about,” said Associate head coach Morgan Singer.
Western controlled possession from the start, creating numerous chances in the early going, but couldn’t finish with Monticello keeper Camille Blaine making a series of big time stops including a couple of leaping punchouts.
“When you have a 6-foot tall goalie, it helps,” said Monticello coach Thomas Warren. “(We tried) to frustrate them into taking shots from distance and believe that our goalie can take care of those, and she did by and large.”
The Warriors broke through midway through the first half from sophomore Kate de Jong to take a 1-0 halftime lead, then added a pair of second half goals from Elizabeth Fabiano and Abby Zimmerman. Keeping the ball in the zone helped Western build and maintain that lead.
“You always like that in a game, having your maximum amount of chances, it gives our offense a lot of runs,” Singer said.
Western leaned a lot on its tremendous depth against the Mustangs with the tough game against Salem. A lot of those reserves stepped up to give Western good minutes.
The Mustangs are replacing some key pieces from last year including William and Mary’s Hannah Keith, but the squad’s defense led by Mallory Yowell elevated its game against the Warriors despite facing a relentless barrage of attacks. A big effort from Hannah Anderson at right back also helped keep Western in check.
“I was really proud of the communication out of my girls back there, They’ve got some fantastic forwards who move off the ball in every kind of crazy, creative, direction,” Warren said. “We came in with the mindset that we’re going to really have to work hard to make them try and break our back line.”
