PIttsfield Girls Come Back to Beat Lenox

PITTSFIELD, Mass. – Pittsfield High girls soccer coach Molly West describes her Generals as a “second half team.”

 

She means in the sense that PHS plays better after half-time of their games.

 

But the way things are shaping up, she just as easily could mean the second half of the season.

 

Pittsfield got goals from three different players and eight saves from Harolyn Castillo on Saturday to earn a 3-1 win over Lenox.

 

The win improved the Generals’ record to 2-8-1 with five games left in the regular season.

 

It also gave Pittsfield two victories in its last three games after an 0-7-1 start.

 

Madison Stetz, Abby Wong and Caprese Conyers each scored a goal on Saturday at Kirvin Park as the Generals erased an early 1-0 deficit on a day when both PHS soccer programs recognized Joe Skutnik and his crew of volunteers, who have for 20 years worked to make the Williams Street pitch the best in the Berkshires.

 

Lenox came out strong and picked up a goal in the first few minutes of the game when Amelia Weibrecht found the back of the net to make it 1-0.

 

After some early lapses at both ends of the field, Pittsfield turned things around in the 31st minute when Stetz scored an unassisted goal from distance to level the score, and the Generals never looked back.

 

“We’re definitely a second half team,” West said. “I don’t know what it is. It takes us 40 minutes to kind of get going. But we move the ball much better in the second half. We use the width of the field. We really spread them out defensively.”

 

Pittsfield continued its late first half resurgence when Molly Pope set up Abby Wong for the go-ahead goal to give the Generals a 2-1 half-time lead.

 

They kept the pressure on after the break, but they were not able to break through against the Millionaires and keepers Sophie Carraro and Sophia Schnackenberg until the 73rd minute of play.

 

That is when BreJai Ellerbee made a steal at midfield and pushed the ball ahead to Wong, who slid it to Conyers about 30 yards from the goal.

 

Conyers dribbled the ball into the 18 and fired  a shot into the corner of the goal to close out the scoring.

 

Lenox made a late push to make it a one-goal game, though.

 

With just more than five minutes to play, the Millionaires’ Jane Elliot fired a shot from the top of the 18 that Castillo was able to block with a dive. She gave up the rebound, and Elliot and Lila Kousch applied pressure on the doorstep before Castillo was able to scramble to her feet and corral the ball.

 

“She’s just a phenomenal athlete all around,” West said of Castillo. “When she’s on – I said this to her from the beginning of the season – I think she’s probably the best keeper in our league, the Kurty/Fielding League, just because of what she sees and her aggressiveness.

 

“But, again, how you show up is how you show up for everything. And I think when we show up, we’re a phenomenal team, and we can play with these teams in our division, as we’ve shown. It’s just changing the culture and changing the mentality.”

 

Pittsfield will play its final five games in the Kurty/Fielding starting on Monday night when it visits Hampshire Regional, a 3-2 winner at Kirvin Park back on Sept. 9.

 

The Millionaires (3-4-1) have a rematch against Grieve Division foe Mount Greylock on Monday under the lights in Lenox.

 

Photos from this game to come.