Girl's Soccer: Mounties Take Control In Second Half To Defeat Chieftains, 2-0

Despite getting outplayed in the first half, the Mounties did not surrender a goal and rebounded nicely in the second half to defeat Ponaganset 2-0 in girls soccer.

Ponaganset came out strong in front of their home crowd, putting a lot of early pressure on the Mountie defense. The Chieftains created a good scoring chance two minutes in but were unable to cash in on their opportunity. A few minutes later Brooke Graham had a good run ahead of the pack but was unable to finish.

Ponaganset controlled everything but the scoreboard in the first half. The Chieftains controlled the midfield with sound passing, dictating the pace and tempo of play. Ponaganset almost scored on a free kick from Taylor Bigwood fourteen minutes into the game, but it was turned away by the Mountie goaltender.

The Mounties only had a couple opportunities in the first half. One came eighteen minutes into the game when MSC had a 2-on-1 opportunity but failed to get a shot on goal. The others came at the end of the half when MSC started to pick up its play.

came out with a sense of urgency in the second half, improving their passing and showing much more desire in the early moments of play. 

After creating consistent pressure for the first thirteen minutes of the second half, Caitlyn Shea was able to net the first goal of the game. Shea dribbled around the goalie, who had come out to challenge her shot and cut off her angles. Shea found the left corner of the net, giving MSC a lead they would not yield. 

The Chieftains had one more scoring chance a few minutes after the Shea goal, when a centering pass forced the goalie to come out high in the box, but she was able to make the save and keep Ponagaset off the board.

Caitlyn Shea had another shot that went over the cross-bar and one that was turned away by the goaltender. But Shea would score again, later in the half on a scramble in front of the Ponaganset goal.

The game was mostly played in the middle of the field after the second goal was scored, and MSC got the road victory 2-0 over Ponaganset.

After the game, MSC Head Coach Marek Wolny said that his team came out slow and sluggish in the first half, stressing that the biggest issue was their inability of his team to link passes together.

Wolny said his team turned it around in the second half by using the whole field and simply outworking the Chieftains.

"Our girls don't like to lose. So they started playing like a team in the second half, and Caitlin [Shea] put a couple in and we were able to get the win," said Wolny. "Our extra attention to our conditioning I think helped us in the second half because our girls looked more fresh than theirs."