BLOOMINGTON — The Class 3A No. 8 Columbus North girls soccer team faced its toughest test to date, squaring off against 3A No. 7 Evansville Memorial in the semifinal round of the Bloomington South Regional Saturday morning.
Both teams never gave an inch in the 80-minute regulation, nor in the 14 minutes of extra time, remaining scoreless, and sending the game to a penaltykick shootout.
In the shootout, the Bull Dogs had a 3-2 lead after conversions by Lauryn Whitley, Claire Lyvers and Jenna Lang, but the Tigers still had their fifth kicker to go. The kick went right at North keeper Mallory Gilley, who cradled it in to send the Bull Dogs to the regional championship where they will take on 3A No. 9 Bloomington South at 7 p.m. tonight.
North coach David Young said he worked with his team on penalty kicks for the past three weeks in case the game was to be decided in that matter. Sure enough, that practice paid off.
“We talked about it all year, putting these girls into situations that they’re going to be in in games,” Young said. “At the end of the day, we told them at the start, it was going to be either 80 minutes, 94 minutes, or it’s going to PKs. We worked on it, and we trained it. The girls stepped up, Mal stepped up, and the girls were composed, and that’s what it’s going to take. Memorial is the best team we’ve faced all year, and we sustained their pressure for 94 minutes.”
The huge credit and unsung heroes in the victory belonged to the Bull Dogs’ back line defensively and the incredible goalkeeping of Gilley.
“They have been all year, giving up 12 goals all year in 19 games,” Young said. “12 goals is ridiculous, and kudos to anybody that plays on our backline and Mal.”
