The opportunities to score came aplenty in game one of a double-header between the girls soccer squads of Cumberland Valley and Governor Mifflin. Cumberland Valley, as the higher seed, took home field advantage, on CV’s Eagle View stadium, which will play host to the PIAA Field Hockey Championship games later this season.
As mentioned, Cumberland Valley had plenty of opportunities to score the ball, particularly CV’s junior Kameron Rase, who tracked down tons of long passes for the Eagles, but struggled in the first half to turn tracked down passes into goals. Postgame, Rase said, “ I think it gets frustrating when the whole team has a really strong couple of passes and we build through the middle into our offensive third, and then we’re just not able to get that last shot in.”
In addition to frequent opportunities, Cumberland Valley was dominated in time of possession. It’s not time to dress up for Halloween just yet, but CV’s defense dressed a vacuum, and certainly came through, pulling away everything coming at them, even on breakaways by Governor Mifflin. One breakaway did connect though, when Governor Mifflin responded to, at the time, Cumberland Valley’s second goal. With about 24 minutes left to keep the championship hopes alive, Governor Mifflin’s Ellie Leflar scored in a chaotic pile near the goal, and avoided a shutout in their first round District 3 game. The goal was a huge momentum saver, as it made the game just 2-1.
Cumberland Valley went on to score 2 more after the Mustangs goal, first when Ella Wineka lined up for a penalty kick with 24 minutes remaining, and later, Evalyn Stoner put a perfect ball across the goal for an easy tap-in for Kameron Rase, which she described as a “cheap goal.”
Governor Mifflin finishes their season 9-3-2, while Cumberland Valley heads into the second round facing Warwick, the third seeded team in the PIAA District 3 4A tournament. While the opponent in the second round will be a tough match, the Eagles roll into the game with some really good momentum, and Eagles junior Kameron Rase spoke on that post-game, “Our confidence is definitely getting boosted. I think we struggle sometimes with being confident in ourselves… We are really going to focus on what we did well and focus on how those goals were created.”
In the 3 day break of games for the Eagles, they will study the film on their next challenge, Warwick, as well as themselves, and Rase said, “Film consists of going in, mainly focusing on things we could’ve improved on, because we take those improvements and we out them into drills each practice.”
The Eagles Quarterfinal game will be at Warwick, taking place Saturday at a time TBD. Governor Mifflin’s season has come to a close.
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