Despite a rainout which postponed Wednesday’s conference match with Polk County, the Avery High women’s soccer team competed in a pair of physical road matches, dropping a 3-0 decision in Hendersonville to the top-5 ranked Lady Bearcats, but rebounded to finish with a 2-2 overtime tie at Burns High School on Good Friday afternoon.
In Monday’s match, Avery held the Lady Bearcats to a goal for most of the first half. However, Hendersonville was able to take advantage of Lady Viking mental miscues to bury an additional two goals in net in the final two minutes of the half to get its three-goal advantage. The second half was a stalemate as the Lady Vikings were held scoreless for a second straight match. The defense remained dedicated to the effort, however, holding the Bearcats scoreless in the final 40 minutes.
“Mentally we didn’t come prepared to play the match, especially in the first half, and they just took it to us,” Avery head coach Tom Evaul said following the defeat.
On Friday the Lady Vikings made the trek to Lawndale in Cleveland County for a non-conference match with the 3A Burns Lady Bulldogs. The Lady Vikings struck early in the contest for a goal, as freshman Emily Banner scored in the first four minutes off an assist by Brianna Strange. The goal held up as the Lady Vikings led 1-0 at intermission.
Burns came out with renewed intensity to open the second half, as the Lady Bulldogs took advantage of a defensive miscommunication to split the defense for a goal in the opening minutes, knotting the match at 1-1. At approximately the sixth minute mark, Avery again retook the lead at 2-1 as Melinda Eggers assisted on a goal inside the box by senior Katie Peters. With around 23 minutes remaining, Burns found a way to escape a scrambling Vikings back line to score the equalizer to tie the match 2-2.
The score remained unchanged through the remainder of regulation, and the teams made the decision to play two-10 minute overtime sessions. The squads remained scoreless through the first session. In the second ten minutes, Burns kept the ball in the Avery defensive half of the field for the overwhelming majority of the period, but the Vikings were stingy, turning away an indirect kick as well as a pair of corner kick opportunities to conclude the match in a tie.
“Burns has a couple of good girls up front and a good sweeper. We scored early, but the match did not play out as easily as perhaps we might have thought it might,” Coach Evaul stated. “We did a lot of standing around, and we need to work on being a little more aggressive and going to the ball a little more than we did in this match.”
This evening Avery traveled to Ledger to play a conference match at Mitchell. Through brutal cold and snowy conditions, the Lady Vikings took a 4-0 lead on the Lady Mountaineers into halftime. Avery continued pouring it on with six additional goals in the first 40 minutes of the second half for a commanding 10-0 win.
Emily Banner tallied a hat trick by midway through the second half for the Lady Vikings as Avery prepares for a home match on Wednesday and a match at North Wilkes on Thursday.
