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Pirates sunk: Perryville can’t solve Orchard Farm, drop Class 2 semifinal
FENTON — A youthful Perryville Pirates team contested the state semifinal stage for the first time in program history, but fell short to Orchard Farm’s masterful defensive scheme.
The defenses of both teams dictated a great portion of the semifinal, but Orchard Farm’s relentless offense broke the tie and kept peppering the opposition en route to a 4-0 win on Friday at World Wide Technology Soccer Park. Brooklyn Moll, Perryville’s sophomore goalkeeper, had her work cut out for her as she would turn away six shots from the Eagles on the day.
Even so, the offensive chances kept coming and Orchard Farm took control in the 20th minute as Alayna Jakul connected with Emma Long from distance. Long easily put it past Moll for the game’s opening goal, tallying the first of three goals for Long. Her hat trick commanded the first three goals in the Eagles’ victory and allowed her side to easily cruise past the strong but inexperienced Pirates.
“She’s a goal scorer. She's scored over 100 goals in her career for us,” Eagles coach Courtney Washburn said. “She's just a phenomenal player. She runs off the ball really well and we really work on trying to find her. A lot of it has to do with how we build out of the back and move the ball through the middle to be able to get that ball to her.”
The stifling defense of Orchard Farm kept the Pirates out of the offensive third for the majority of the game, putting just one shot on target for the duration of the contest. The phenomenal defense gave the Eagle offense more time to work and the time of possession reflected this major discrepancy in the Perryville effort.
“We've talked about winning every 50/50 ball and they executed that today,” Washburn said. “They were super excited to be here and you could tell that they wanted to play for each other and wanted to win for each other.”
Perryville’s lone shot on goal came soon after Orchard Farm’s go-ahead goal in the first half. Kyla Schnurbusch settled for a shot from well outside of the box which went straight for the bottom right corner of the goal. Charlize Williams extended her fingers and pushed it wide, preserving the lead and momentum for Orchard Farm.
“It wasn't heart that kept us from playing, but I think we might have showed some nerves and just never had been here before,” Perryville coach Jerry Fulton said. “I think that was showing very big.”
With the loss, Perryville will take on Pleasant Hill third place at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday at World Wide Technology Soccer Park. They’ll play Pleasant Hill in their final game of the season while Orchard Park will play MICDS in the state championship game at 5 p.m.
The Pleasant Hill Chicks, whose record fell to 17-6, dropped their semifinal bout against MICDS after a multi-goal second half from the Rams. Their district championship and quarterfinal games were both decided by one goal, so the Chicks are no strangers to having their backs against the wall in a win-or-go-home situation.
“It is what it is. We're trying to bounce back and play better in the third-place game tomorrow,” Fulton said. “What do we want? What do we want tomorrow? That's the bottom line.”