Girls soccer beats Oviedo 2-1 in quarterfinals
photo by Ava West
Center back Riley Sophia takes a free shot from out half of the field. On Feb. 8, for the first time in six years, varsity girls soccer beat Oviedo in the regional quarterfinals, 2-1.
Rain, injuries and a long history of losing to Oviedo did not matter.
On Feb. 8, for the first time in six years, varsity girls soccer beat Oviedo, 2-1. This time, it was in the regional quarterfinals, and the team knew they had a shot after a 3-3 tie on Jan. 14.
“We just have this edge against them. We tied them at the beginning of the season, so we just knew we had to win,” midfielder Reagan Fitzgerald said.
This was not the only obstacle the team had to overcome in this game. Goalkeeper Aryana Rosenblum was injured in the second half, but she knew she had to shake it off for the sake of her team, which is exactly what she did.
“She was basically limping after that [for] the whole game but she still did really good,” striker and right wing Valeria Romero said. “She couldn’t even take the goal kicks any more. She still stayed in goal [and] saved a lot of them.”
The first goal of the game was by Fitzgerald, off a corner kick from center back Riley Sophia where Fitzgerald headed it in from the back post. The tying goal from Oviedo snuck in after the girls could not clear it fast enough.
Oviedo was ranked third in the state and had only given up 12 goals all season, but five of those were to Hagerty.
After the clock ran out during regulation, captains of both teams were called to the center of the field to flip the coin for who started with the ball in overtime. Oviedo won the coin toss and the teams switched sides. Romero scored in the last 20 seconds of the first 10 minutes in overtime. After the ball bounced off of a teammate’s head, Romero kicked it into the right corner of the goal and scored the last goal of the game.
Oviedo received many free kicks throughout the game, including three in overtime, but it was not enough to win.
“We had to hunker down in the last 10 minutes,” midfielder Alexis Madlang said. “The clock felt like it was going slower and slower every time we looked at it.”
The varsity girls soccer team’s next game, regional semifinals, is at Lake Brantley on Friday at 7 p.m.. Tickets can be purchased on gofan.co.
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