What a night for the Lady Cavs Thursday!! The girls beat Radford 2-1. It’s the first time in 3 years that we have beat them and only the 2nd time varsity has beat them since joining the Three Rivers District in 2018!! I feel like the girls played a very strong full 80 minutes of soccer. That is something we have been working on because we have been having a good half and then a not so good half. We’ve really been working on keeping high energy and playing up for the entire game and last night the girls did that!
In the first half, we had multiple chances at a goal that barely missed. We had a lot of momentum offensively. Then, with around 15 minutes left in the first half, Valeria Rosales battled with a Radford defender and got the ball dropped back to Callie Harris around the top of the 18-yard box. Callie buried a high shot back post to give us a 1-0 lead. Then, around 10 minutes later, we had it deep in our offensive half again. A Radford defender went to clear it out of the box, and it landed at Callie’s feet around 10 yards outside of the box. Callie took a left-footed one touch shot and put it right over the goalie to make it 2-0.
Our defense had a very strong night. Jackie Arellano-Torres, Genesis Harmon, Elena McKenzie, and Aliza Hardy all had a great game for us on the back line. Our defense is pretty new this year since we had 3 senior defenders last year. Jackie and Aliza both mainly played in the midfield last year for us, but they have both transitioned really well into being starting defenders for us. We pulled Genesis up this year from JV, and she has stepped right in and has been giving us some really good minutes at center back.
Elena is our only returning defender from last year’s starting backline. She has done a great job continuing to improve her game, along with helping the others that we have had to move to defense. Alexis Sheffey had 8 saves on the night. She was very active coming off of her line to pick up through balls Radford was trying to send through. She also did a great job of coming out on Radford’s corners and getting her hands on the ball while it was in the air to get it out of the box. Jackie and Alexis both have been huge leaders for us in our defensive half. Jackie has really stepped up to switching to center back and has become the quarterback of our defense.
Overall, this was a great team win for the Lady Cavs!! It was also an awesome finish to a busy 4 days finishing 3-0 for the week.
On Tuesday, the girls won another close battle at George Wythe. Alisia Torres Lopez got the scoring going for us after being really aggressive on a goal kick. She won the ball out of the air and took it straight to goal with a nice finish to put us up 1-0. Then, around 10 minutes later, we had a great build-up of passing combos that led to our next goal. It started with Yuleimy Solis winning the ball out of the air in the midfield. Then she passed it up to Valeria Rosales, who found Alisia with a quick pass. Then Alisia sent a great through ball into the middle that Callie Harris ran onto. Callie took a touch and then put it into the back of the net to make it 2-0 before halftime. Our defense had another very strong game against George Wythe. Alexis Sheffey had 11 saves on the day. George Wythe had a couple good looks at goals, but Alexis came up with multiple massive saves to keep us in the lead.
This past week was a great one for our girls. They have grown so much already as a team, and I’m excited to continue to watch them grow throughout the rest of the season. Next week, we have two away games at Martinsville and James River.
We have some action shots and video 📹 as well !
A.S.P.N on The Hill 