By HUNTER O. LYLE
OLEAN – Facing their cross-town rivals in front of their home crowd, the Olean girls’ soccer team was unable to break their four-game losing streak, falling 8-0 to Allegany-Limestone.
At the start of the game, the two teams had experienced vastly different starts of the season. While the Lady Gators had amassed a winning 7-0 record, Olean’s first few weeks had produced a lackluster result, with the Lady Huskies sitting at 1-5.
“We are a really young team. We graduated a lot of people and we have a lot of injuries. I mean, we have two girls that have had surgeries so we have a few starters that are sitting on the bench,” said Olean head coach Dan Freeman. “We have been improving. We’ve been working hard and I can see improvement.”
The disparity of skill between the two squads was obviously in the opening minutes. Using their ball control and speed, A-L weaved up field before threading a pass to a wide open forward. As they continued to get open looks up close, the Lady Gators peppered Olean’s goalkeeper, Emma Edwards, sending multiple shots her way in just the first two minutes alone. While Edwards protected the net ferociously, coming away with last minute saves from all directions, it wouldn’t be long before the Lady Huskies’ armor began to crack.
In the ninth minute, it finally happened. Following a corner kick, the Lady Gators somehow collected the ball despite a crowd of red and gold defenders. Amidst the confusion, Madison Honeck rocketed off a left shot that narrowly found the back of the net, putting A-L up early.
Finding themselves in a hole, the Lady Huskies seemed discouraged. The already panicking defense began to unravel, with miscommunications and poor coverage allowing the Lady Gators to continue to push deep in Olean territory.
In the meantime, the Lady Huskies’ offense failed to break past A-L’s back line, who had confidently set up at midfield. On the rare occasion that Olean would make a dash downfield, their drives were short lived.
For the Lady Gators, however, they refused to let up. After nearly 25 scoreless minutes, they surged. With just over six minutes remaining in the half, Kennedy Honeck punched another score in before they increased their lead to 3-0 minutes later. In the closing moments, with 1:19 remaining on the clock, Cait Kellogg collected the ball at point blank range and booted it past Edwards, adding another blow to an already deflated Lady Huskies team.
“(Olean) was packed in there pretty good so it was hard to find passing lanes and what not,” said Allegany-Limestone head coach Dale MacArther. “We finally changed the field once or twice and got some opportunities off that. We had to do something to get (Olean) to spread out so I think we did that a few times to good effect.”
The second half looked very much like the first. A-L continued to dominate the pitch, holding long, pressurized possessions inside Olean’s turf and casting a barrage of shots towards the back of the net. Edwards, facing a relentless opposition offense, held strong and came away with several dramatic diving saves to hold off the Lady Gators. However, while the Lady Huskies were able to stop the immediate bleeding, their offense still failed to materialize into any significant drives.
Similar to the first half, Olean’s last line of defense could only hold out for so long. After 20 scoreless minutes, the Lady Gators struck again, this time coming from Liza Giardini on a breakaway that pitted her solely against the Lady Huskies’ goalkeeper. Smelling blood in the water, the Lady Gators swarmed. Six minutes later, with just under 14 minutes remaining in the game, Kellogg nabbed her second goal of the game, scoring from beyond the box. Again, A-L refused to let up, scoring two more times before the final buzzer to secure their eighth win.
“We’re playing well. Defensively we’re playing well. We’re looking for and finding combinations. We have a variety of people scoring,” said MacArther on his team’s undefeated start to the season. “It’s not like we have to rely on any one person so we’re playing well as a group.”
While the Lady Gators will move on to tougher opponents, playing Fredonia and Southwestern in coming week, Olean heads back to the drawing board as they look for a way to pull together and get their season on track.
“Our main focus will be passing. Passing and touch is the biggest thing in soccer and controlling the ball so your first touch doesn’t go to the other team,” said Freeman. “I really want to just focus on those two things at this point in time because I think the other teams are passing around us. We get the ball and we’re not getting it to other players. We’re kind of losing it on that first touch.”
