Girl's Soccer: Avengers Squeak out a Victory Against the Falcons

East Greenwich and Cranston West played close Division I soccer match on Wednesday night, which pitted the leaders of the Central and Southern Divisions, at East Greenwich High School. The Avengers applied early pressure with their pristine passing, but only found the net once, and had to grind out a 2-1 win.

East Greenwich came out with a purpose to start the game in front of their home crowd, and didn't waste any time before gaining 1-0 lead 2 minutes into the contest. Skylar Leblanc drove up the sideline, pivoted, and dropped a pass to the trailer Megan Greineder, who found the left side of the net, completing a pretty play for the Avengers.

Cranston West picked up their play following the goal, and controlled possession for the next ten minutes. Though the Falcons held possession, they struggled to create scoring chances.

The Avengers regained control of play at 13 minutes in and began to put pressure on the Falcon defense. In a role reversal, Greineder found Leblanc for a shot in front of the net, but a great save was made by Danielle St. Pierre of Cranston West. 

East Greenwich played stout defense for the remainder of the half, and created some good counterattack chances, including several breakaways, which they were unable to finish. The game went to halftime with East Greenwich clinging to a 1-0 lead.

The Falcons were determined to mount a comeback in the second half, and it was evident from the start. Ariana Stanton found Meghan Hammond streaking towards the goal for a header, but her shot was denied by Alexandra Place, preserving the one goal lead. 

East Greenwich responded after the big save from their goaltender and won, what turned out to be a huge ball at midfield, which set up a throw-in that resulted in the second goal for the Avengers. Allison Davis scored off of a good feed from Eva Trinque.

To the credit of Cranston West, they did not shrink following the goal, they turned up the intensity and dominated the rest of the game.

The Falcons tightened up the score and reduced their deficit to one, with a goal from Leanna Ly, off of a corner kick from Alex Stanton in the 55th minute.

Trailing by one, Cranston West played some risky soccer, by pulling a lot of players forward to play offense. This resulted in more pressure, but it also gave the Avengers a few breakaway opportunities. But East Greenwich could not take advantage, and Danielle St. Pierre made several huge saves to keep the Falcons in the game. But Cranston West could not find the net and time ran out on the Falcons, with the scoreboard reading 2-1 East Greenwich.

Cranston West Head Coach Charles Pearson gave East Greenwich a lot of credit after the game.

"I think East Greenwich is going to be the top team in the state. They're quick. They move the ball fast. They just go," said Pearson.

"Did we have the opportunities? By all means. I think we caught East Greenwich very flat in the second half, and we dominated about 25 minutes of the second half. We just couldn't get the tying goal," Pearson added, reflecting on his team's second half performance.

East Greenwich improves to 8-0 on the year, while Cranston West drops to 4-3.