ATHENS BOUNCES BACK FROM LOSS TO BLANK NEB, 5-0
By: Tim Birney | AthensWildcats.com | October 7, 2021 | Photo courtesy David Alliger
ATHENS — Athens bounced back from its first league loss Tuesday with a
dominant performance in a 5-0 win over Northeast Bradford here Thursday
night in NTL girls soccer action.
“It’s a great bounce-back win for us,” said Athens coach Rich Pitts. “We played amazing soccer throughout the match.
“We
feel like we are hitting our stride at the right time, but understand
after Tuesday night, we have no room for error,” noted Pitts in
reference to the Lady Wildcats’ 3-2 home loss to Wyalusing.
“We
played a really talented NEB team tonight and performed at a great
level,” added Pitts. “We were able to go deep into our bench and allow
players who have been working very hard to get valuable playing time for
the future.”
The Lady Wildcats took an early lead when sophomore
Kendra Merrill took a through-ball from senior Delaney Stedge and
deposited it into the back of the net.
In the 27th minute, senior
Hannah Walker took a feed from freshman Addison Wheeler and beat the
NEB keeper for the first of her three goals in the game to make it 2-0.
About
six minutes later, sophomore Mya Thompson set up Walker for a
point-blank shot extend the lead to 3-0, which is where it stood at the
half.
In the opening minutes of the second half, Walker returned
the favor and set Thompson up for a close-range shot that found the net
to make it 4-0.
Walker finished off her hat trick with an unassisted goal about three minutes later to push the Lady Wildcat lead to 5-0.
Holly Towner put NEB on the board in the 75th minute to provide the final margin.
Athens had a 12-8 advantage in shots-on-goal, but NEB had a 4-1 edge in corner kicks.
Junior Karlee Bartlow registered five saves in net for Athens.
The
Lady Wildcats, now 8-5 overall, are 6-1 in the league and tied atop the
NTL standings with Troy. They play at Troy Saturday morning.
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