Duffy’s goal wins it for West girls soccer team

MOUNTULLA— The frustration, and praise, was mutual.

West Rowan senior Kathryn McNeely raced down the field a dozen or more times Wednesday night, lined up a shot on goal and fired.

Mustang keeper Sarah Ivey turned away every chance, leaving McNeely no choice but to turn around and shake her head on the way back upfield.

Ivey, a junior, made 29 saves, but still took a loss. Lauren Duffy’s shot from in close in the 22nd minute was the only ball the Falcons slipped past their South Piedmont Conference rival in a 1-0 victory.

“She’s good. No, she’s a great goalie,”McNeely quickly amended. “I wasn’t getting my shots where I wanted them.”

She was, however, managing to get them off every few seconds, or so it seemed to Ivey.

“I hope so,”the keeper responded when asked if she was frustrating McNeely with all her saves. “I know she was frustrating me.

“It was total chaos,”Ivey added. “They came at me from all angles, all sides. They came up the sides more than teams usually do and just kept taking shots.”

Ivey turned away a half-dozen West attacks in the opening minutes before Duffy snuck in behind the defense, chasing down a long ball into the corner. The junior beat a pair of oncoming defenders and then surprised Ivey by going low, squeaking a shot past the near post despite having a lot more operating room to the high side.

“Our defense is good, but they’re great,”Ivey said. “That was a great shot.”

Nothing but great saves followed — and groans from Falcons coach Rebecca Snider, who wanted a more comfortable lead.

“We kept kicking it to her. We’d go down to the end line and shoot instead of bringing it back out,”Snider said. “You’ve got to do a little better than one out of 30.”

Ivey’s counterpart, Sara Pieper, saw limited action at the opposite end of the field. East’s offense struggled to mount an attack in the first half before responding after halftime with a couple of scoring chances.

Junior Lyndsey Shinn took three shots in the second half as the Mustangs pressed the attack in the opening minutes. Pieper finished with seven saves.

“The second half we had a lot better action on the field than in the first half,”East head coach Jon Heidrick said. “We played a pretty solid game all the way around. Sometimes a goal is going to sneak by. We’ve had a lot of close games this season and unfortunately we haven’t been on the right end of a lot of them.”

West, which improved to 11-2-1 overall and 7-2-1 in the SPC, escaped from the closest of close soccer matches with a 0-0 tie Monday night against Harding. The standoff against the SPC’s first-place team kept the Falcons in the hunt for the league’s third playoff spot.

“That was the best game of the season and the best game I’ve been a part of since I’ve played soccer here,”McNeely said. “We’re enjoying it. We’re trying to play hard and hold onto it.”

A loss to the Mustangs (3-9, 2-8) would’ve been rather damaging to that goal, which explained why Snider spent so much of the night pacing the sidelines wearing a worried frown on her face.

“East played really well,”Snider said. “Even though they weren’t getting a lot of shots on goal, they beat us to all the 50-50 balls. We were fortunate Duffy was able to stick that one in the net.”

NOTES: Ivey actually shares some of the net-minding duties with Christal Maclamroc, who was limited to no-hands duties Wednesday thanks to some bruised knuckles. The duo has combined for three shutouts this season. “Sarah’s not getting peppered as much as last year,”Heidrick said. “The defense is getting there, to where I thought they should be.”