Lady Indians spoil senior night for McClain
Hillsboro's Kobie Miles and McClain's Bailey Parson battle in their county and conference rivalry game, Thursday at MHS. (HCP Photos/Jim Jones)
The Hillsboro Lady Indians avenged an earlier-season loss at home to McClain by defeating the Lady Tigers, 4-2 on senior night in Greenfield on Thursday, Oct. 3.
When McClain and Hillsboro play, it’s always a big county and conference rivalry where records and venues don’t determine the outcome sometimes.
McClain had defeated the Lady Indians by a 2-1 score in Hillsboro earlier in the season, and it was a physical and evenly played game, which is how this one pretty much ended.
“This was a great win for us,” said Hillsboro head coach Amanda Miller. “It was a really physical game, and my girls are capable of being physical and competing in these kinds of tough games.
“We always talk about playing physical but not dirty, and I’m really hard on them about that.”
Both teams had opportunities to score early in the match, and it wasn’t until the 20:00 mark of the first half that the Lady Indians broke through and scored on a goal by freshman Ella Jordan on a nice assist from Kobie Miles.
Hillsboro added another goal two minutes later when Taylor Thoroman found the back of the next and put the Lady Indians up 2-0, which is how the first half ended.
“Overall, I thought at times we played really aggressive but tense, and for the first 20 minutes we controlled a lot of the game and had several scoring opportunities,” McClain head coach Blain Bergstrom said “But sometimes when you don’t score a goal when you get those chances, and if you make a mistake defensively you can be up 2-0 or down 2-0, and that’s what I felt happened at the start.
“We had some chances to score and didn’t, and they were able to capitalize on our mistakes and go up 2-0.”
The Lady Indians increased their lead to 3-0 early in the second half when Kobie Miles scored on a penalty kick at the 27:46 mark.
This was the point of the match that the McClain girls seemed to come to life offensively.
Sophomore Paisley Pryor scored the Lady Tigers’ first goal at the 23:49 mark and followed it up as the clock was winding down with another goal with 4:01 left the clock to pull McClain to within one at 3-2.
But as quickly as it looked like the Lady Tigers had gained all the momentum, Grace Palmer scored Hillsboro’s fourth goal of the match less than a minute later and basically put the game away.
“We were able to battle back and score two goals late and get to 3-2, but then they came right back and scored, and when you’re down 4-2 with just minutes left, it’s really hard to come back from that,” Bergstrom said.
“We had four different girls score tonight, and we have shared the wealth all season,” Miller said. “I’m really happy about how we came back and scored that fourth goal after McClain had cut our lead to 3-2.
“We’ve struggled with that a lot this year, but we’ve talked about and improved on that some lately.”
Coach Bergstrom touched on a couple of things that he thought really probably determined the outcome in this hard-fought and closely played match.
“You’re going to have some ups and downs in all sports and when you make mistakes you need to just focus on the positives,” Bergstrom said. “The little mistakes that we’re making right now are hurting us a lot more now than they did earlier in the season, and we’re not capitalizing on the good things.
“Sometimes it really come down to execution, better movement and touches on the ball, plus communication.”
Hillsboro will play next at home Monday, Oct. 7 when they host Peebles. McClain travels to Fairfield on Monday, Oct. 7 for another tough county rivalry game, then closes out the regular season at home on Wednesday, Oct. 9 when they host Western Brown.
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