U14 girls start season with two impressive wins

After a splen­did fall cam­paign in which the Ober­lin U14 Girls Soc­cer team dropped only two matches dur­ing the sea­son, the team looks to add a mix of new tal­ent into the lineup this spring with three new­com­ers, Anas­ta­sia Mar­tin, Liz Nejad­fard and Niyma Cole­man join­ing the team ranks.

Dur­ing the pre-season prac­tices and in their first cou­ple games of the spring sea­son, it looks as if the group has come together nicely. The most imme­di­ate tes­ti­mony to the team’s play occurred Sat­ur­day as they pushed their record to 2-0 with a 7-1 romp past Vermilion.

Coach Ingrid Weaver was most impressed with her team’s efforts to dis­trib­ute the ball and work their pass­ing lanes all across the field. The result was seven dif­fer­ent play­ers scor­ing the seven goals this weekend.

With a mix of accu­rate pass­ing and sound posi­tion play, Weaver's charges took con­trol from the out­set. It wasn't long before the offen­sive pres­sure would yield results.

After con­trol­ling an errant clear from the Ver­mil­ion defense, Zoe Bickel set up Sarah Parsh for the game's first tally just seven min­utes in. Shortly there­after, Dazhane Hill cap­i­tal­ized on a loose ball in the mid­field, drib­bled deftly upfield and deposited a shot into the back of the net to tally the team's sec­ond score.

Team new­com­ers, Mar­tin and Nejad­fard com­bined for the third score when Anas­ta­sia deliv­ered nice touch from the right side and Liz did the rest, deposit­ing her shot just inside the right post. Seren­ity Crow­ley com­pleted the first half’s scor­ing by rifling home a free kick from just out­side the penalty area, giv­ing Ober­lin a 4-0 advan­tage at the break.

The sec­ond half play resulted in three more tal­lies for the home team, Yana Miller deliv­er­ing an unas­sisted score in the 37th minute, Miranda Schaum drove home the team’s sixth goal on a nice pass from Miller, and Baily Wilbanks closed out the Ober­lin scor­ing in the 61st minute with another unas­sisted score, touch­ing the ball just inside the right post.

Oberlin's defense was anchored by the quar­tet of Ella Boyer, Rhi­an­non McKee, Crow­ley, and Maya Peters, as they were more than ready for any offense Vemil­ion mus­tered. Goalie duties were ably shared by Miller, Wilbanks and Megan Proy.

The mid­field play through­out the con­test was superb with Asta Rus­tad, Cora Spur­lock, Proy, Bickel and oth­ers con­sis­tently con­trolled the ball and con­nected with their passes between the defense and the offense.

In Oberlin’s sea­son opener ear­lier last week, the U14s headed on the road to face an always tough Lorain squad. It was no dif­fer­ent this year, as Ober­lin shook off the first game jit­ters and punched in a cou­ple first half goals which stood up for a 2-0 win.

Goalie Jes­sica Weaver earned the shutout, mak­ing six saves on the day. Ober­lin broke the ice on a gor­geous play in the 14th minute–Wilbanks in traf­fic deliv­ered a per­fect ball to the Miller’s right foot who, from the 18, one-timed a shot into the upper left hand cor­ner of the net beyond the reach of the Lorain keeper.

Oberlin’s insur­ance goal came after a nice shot by Schaum which the Lorain keeper stopped, Miller was in the right place at the right time and touched home the rebound for the 2-0 lead and the final tally.

The team will face stiffer com­pe­ti­tion this week­end when they face Mid­view at home on Sat­ur­day morning.

Posted by Scott Mahoney on Apr 27 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.