BERLIN- Despite dominating for much of the contest, Stephen Decatur’s girls’ varsity soccer team fell to visiting North Caroline, 4-2, on Tuesday to fall to 0-2 on the young season.
Right from the start, the Seahawks put immense pressure on North Caroline and spent much of the first half in the Bulldogs’ defensive end. Decatur was winning possession on the loose balls and pounding it into the North Caroline defensive end, but couldn’t break through, partly because of missed opportunities and partly because of outstanding defense and goalkeeping by the Bulldogs.
While Decatur couldn’t take advantage of several early scoring opportunities, North Caroline was just the opposite. With only a handful of possessions in their own offensive end, the Bulldogs made the most of them and built an early 3-0 lead. North Caroline got on the board first with a nice lofted shot over the Decatur keeper for a 1-0 lead with 24:45 remaining in the first half.
Decatur’s Lexie VanKirk prepares to launch a shot from the perimeter during Tuesday’s game against North Caroline. VanKirk got the Seahawks on the board about half way through the first half.
Photo by Shawn Soper
North Caroline added another goal in and unsettled situation in front of the Decatur net about 10 minutes later at the 14:50 mark in the first half to increase its lead to 2-0. A little over a minute later, the Bulldogs scored again on a one-on-one situation with a shot that got by the diving Decatur defense.
Suddenly, Decatur found itself trailing 3-0 in a game they clearly appeared to be dominating other than on the scoreboard. The Seahawks hunkered down and stopped North Caroline the rest of the way, while continuing to put pressure on the Bulldog defense. Finally, Decatur’s Lexie VanKirk broke through with a goal off an assist by Mallory Varra at the 9:24 mark in the first half to cut the North Caroline lead to 3-1.
Neither team scored in the remaining nine minutes-plus in the first half and North Caroline took at 3-1 lead into halftime.
Decatur pulled to within one at 3-2 with a goal in the second half, but the damage had been done early and the missed opportunities were too much to overcome and North Caroline hung on for the win. With the loss, Decatur fell to 0-2 on the season after falling to Kent Island in the season opener last week by the same 3-2 score.