Chuck Larsen
Steve Scott’s soccer Chicks came away with a pair of good, solid wins over 4A power Cache Tuesday night at Hampton Field.
Freshman forward Hannah Elrod’s hat-trick got the ladies a 3-2 upset over the seventh-ranked Lady Bulldogs, and Italian exchange student Piero Valmassoi scored twice to lead the tenth-ranked Fightin’ Chicks to a 5-0 shutout in the nightcap.
Elrod gave the Chicks their first lead as they pinned Cache early with a 15-yarder from out front, but the Bulldogs’ Mallory Brown got the equalizer about 10 minutes later on a very similar setup on the other end.
“We came out this time with a little more enthusiasm and fire,” Scott said of the Lady Chicks' quick start. “We’ve usually been playing as a second half team but came out very quickly tonight.”
The girls had another strong second half to pull off the upset. Elrod got the lead back early, but Cache equalized again on a score by Samantha Gonzalez. Elrod pushed Chickasha out to the lead for good with her third goal about halfway into the half.
That would be it for the freshman as she spent the rest of the match on the sidelines icing her sore knee. The defense did the rest, playing outstanding ball control for the final 20 minutes to negate the Dogs’ potent offense and put the game away.
“Once we got into that situation, we moved some people into different spots and changed a lot of things to put more numbers behind the ball and that really helped us out,” Scott said.
Senior keeper Carly Blasingame, still playing with an achy right elbow, came up with eight saves.
The Chickasha boys dominated their match, jumping out to a 2-0 lead halftime lead on a header from senior captain Colt Dixon. The header was set up on a corner kick from sophomore midfielder Erick Hernandez.
The Chicks second goal came on a penalty kick by Valmassoi.
Sophomore forward Jaime Ruiz set up the third goal early in the second half, digging the ball out in the left corner and pushing it out to Valmassoi for a 12-yard pop from the elbow.
Junior mid Aaron Beckenkamp scored 10 minutes later, picking up a long ball out of the back and burying it from 10 yards out.
Ruiz capped off the scoring from about 20 yards out, picking up a through ball, juking his defender and quickly converting with the right foot for a 5-0 lead.
With about 25 minutes left, Scott pulled most of the front and midfield players, and the reserves still kept Cache pinned down for most of their shift to close things out.
Sophomore keeper Zach Widener had 11 saves as the Chicks stayed perfect at 3-0.
“Outside of the tournaments, we’ve been playing really well,” Scott said. “That may have had something to do with those early morning matches, but we’ve come together quite a bit.”
Their preseason schedule toughened them up pretty quickly and got them some attention.
“I didn’t tell the boys, but the rankings came out this morning and we were ranked tenth,” Scott said. “They deserve it after this game.
“Going up to the Catoosa tournament gave a lot of people a chance to see us. Every non-tournament preseason game we played we played well and tonight was just another showing of how we’ve been playing. We defended our turf pretty well.”
His young Chicks bounced back after coming away with a split from highly-ranked 4A Heritage Hall on Friday. The girls (2-1) lost 4-0 to the top-ranked Lady Chargers, but the boys beat the eighth-ranked Hall 2-0 on goals from Valmassoi and Tyler Wilson.
They’ll be off now until after the spring break when they host their annual Chickasha Invitational on Thursday, March 25.
