Kenton’s Addy Haudenschield (left) defends Bryan’s Josey Arnold during Wednesday’s Division IV sectional girls soccer final at Golden Bear Stadium in Bryan.
Jonathan LeBlanc | Bryan Times
BRYAN — In just under 30 seconds, Kenton grabbed a 2-0 lead over Bryan on Wednesday night midway through the first half of its district quarterfinal matchup, and the Golden Bears wanted to tie it before the break.
They did just that.
Macy Burton scored with 17 seconds left in the first half to make it 2-2 while an Ava Zimmerman goal late in the second half gave Bryan a 3-2 win over the Wildcats at Golden Bear Stadium in Bryan.
“Once they scored that second goal, all I thought was, ‘We need to score two before the half. If we score two before the half, we can win and we have it in the bag,’” said Burton, a senior captain who was battling illness on Wednesday. “I think it really proved that when we work together as a team, great things happen. We score two goals in like 10 minutes. And we definitely had a lot of possession, so it wasn’t too big of a worry.
“But yeah, down two goals is pretty scary.”
Those two scary goals happened in quick succession.
The first came off a Kinze Sprang free kick. Sprang fired her free kick from the right side towards Bryan goalkeeper Mylie Vollmer, who couldn’t corral it on the left side.
Kenton’s Emma Hougendobler was right there for the loose ball and tapped it in to give the Wildcats a 1-0 lead with 19:05 left in the first half.
Ellie Minter, a freshman forward for the Wildcats, then added to her team’s lead by winning the ball away from Bryan and firing a shot almost directly from the left side, which bounced off a diving Vollmer and into the net to make it 2-0 Kenton with 18:36 remaining in the first half.
Those two shots on goal were also the lone two in the first half for Kenton.
“Bryan’s a very good team and we know that they play very good defense — they haven’t allowed very many goals this year (20 entering Wednesday). So we talked about needing to capitalize on any of the chances that we do get, because we knew it would be limited,” Kenton coach Toby Brown said. “… Our star senior, Kenzi Sprang, played that free ball into the middle and our senior followed it — and that’s something that we preach all year is follow it, follow it, follow it. We followed it and she gave up that rebound, so we were able to finish it.
“And just real quick after that, our freshman that’s been great for us this year, Ellie Minter, she stole that ball down there in the corner and took it straight to the goal. She’s got a heck of a left foot, and she put some power behind that and just powered it in.”
But even up to that point, Bryan was dominating possession since the start of the match, which included four shots on goal in the opening 10 minutes.
Piper Hanna was the one taking most of those shots to start and finally found the back to cut it to 2-1 Wildcats.
Zimmerman, after getting a lob pass from Cassidy Dietsch, fired a pass to Hanna, who won a one-on-one with Kenton goalkeeper Ruby Syter with 10:49 left in the first half.
Burton then fired a left-footed shot from just beyond the 15-yard line. Syter tipped it, but the ball rolled over her hands and in the net to make it 2-2 just before half and gave the Golden Bears some much-needed momentum.
“That was huge,” Bryan coach Danielle McQuillin said. “I had told (assistant) coach (Delaney) Valderas that we needed to get another goal before the second half because I knew momentum needed to shift.”
Zimmerman capitalized on that momentum after receiving a pass from fellow junior captain Josey Arnold late in the second half.
Zimmerman sprinted up the left side, tapped the ball from her left foot to her right to outmaneuver a Kenton defender and fired a shot over Styer and under the crossbar with 9:17 left in the match.
“I just knew I had to get it off,” Zimmerman said. “We were in a desperate time, and I knew that we just needed more shots and I had an opening. And I didn’t see anybody else open, so I just took it.”
The Golden Bears dominated possession in the second half as well, and the shot tallies showed it. Bryan totaled 24 shots (20 on goal) on the night, with 11 (nine on goal) in the second half, while Kenton had just five, which were all on goal.
“Me, Ava and Mylie were the only starters from last year, so everybody is really coming together, working together,” Burton said. “Our passes are getting better. We’ve definitely seen improvement throughout the season.”
“I think the possession is most of the reason why we won that game, because we kept our calm and we just knew we had it in the bag,” Zimmerman said.
Vollmer finished with three saves while Styer, a senior, tallied 19 and recorded her 500th career save in the process.
“Ruby has been great all year for us,” Brown said. “She’s had a tremendous career at Kenton High School. She’s a four-year starter, and for her to get her 500th save tonight, I was very, very proud of her to do that.”
Kenton, the No. 5 seed from the Division IV Ottawa District, ended the season 6-11-1 after going 1-16-1 last year and went from 97 goals allowed last year to 47 this season.
“We put a lot of work into the offseason, and to win six games this year is outstanding,” Brown said. “We beat teams we didn’t even compete with last year.”
No. 4-seeded Bryan (9-6-1), meanwhile, won its third consecutive sectional crown and advanced to a district semifinal against No. 1 Ottawa-Glandorf (15-2). Kickoff is slated for 5 p.m. next Wednesday at Titan Stadium in Ottawa.
“I definitely think a lot of people didn’t expect us to be here right now because of the seniors that (graduated),” Zimmerman said. “I think we proved everybody wrong kind of.”
Jonathan LeBlanc wrote this story for LimaScores.com
