McCann Tech Girls Fall in State Voc Semis
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. -- It took an unlucky bounce to bounce the McCann Tech girls soccer team from the State Vocational tournament on Sunday afternoon.
For nearly 72 minutes, Hornets played Norfolk Aggie to a scoreless draw. It looked like sudden death OT or, worse yet, penalty kicks, would be the only thing to decide who went on to Tuesday's state final.
But with 8 minutes, 2 seconds on the clock, the Rams were the beneficiaries of an own goal, and they held on for a 1-0 win.
"[Keeper] Alanza [Quinones] played a good game," McCann coach Mike Dowling said. "Alanza played a good game, Mo [Martel] played a good game. Bre [Tassone] played a good game. Our whole defense played well.
"I'm just disappointed we didn't win. We did everything but win."
In fact, it was an aggressive play in the back that led to the Norfolk goal.
The Rams were taking their fourth corner kick of the game from the left wing. Kourtney Costello took the restart and sent the ball into the 18 for Gina Coote. Coote sent the ball across the middle, where a Hornet defender attempted to clear, but instead the ball caromed off of her and past Quinones (11 saves).
The Hornets (14-4-1) went up and down the field with the Rams throughout the first half. After giving up a couple of strong opportunities early, McCann had the better of the play from about the 20th minute until half-time.
McCann had a golden opportunity in the 23rd minute when a Norfolk defender stumbled over the ball at the top of the 18. She quickly scrambled up and joined a double team to stop Natalie Diesz from getting off a shot at the edge of the 6-yard area.
A few minutes later, McCann had another chance when it was awarded a free kick about 35 yards from the goal. Martel took the kick and sent it on target, but Norfolk's Emily Robinson reached up to knock it down and corralled the rebound to end the threat.
Norfolk came out strong to start the second half, firing four on-target shots from outside the 18 in the first 10 minutes of the half. But Quinones was able to make the stop each time.
Meanwhile, at the other end, the Rams' Hannah Gray bottled up McCann's leading scorer, Aimee Dowling while Norfolk's sweeper maintained the last line of defense.
After generating four shots on the goal in the first half, McCann could not get a shot on Robinson in the last 40 minutes.
"They're a great team," Norfolk Aggie coach Brett Drake said of McCann. "They're one of the toughest teams we've played all year, and they played a great game. But our defense played really well.
"The sweeper kind of helped us out. ... We changed into that, and we also know [Dowling] is their top scorer, so we man-marked her.
"That whole team played well. We just got lucky with the bounce."