Lady Tigers soccer notches 2 big wins

GREENFIELD — The McClain girls varsity soccer team picked up two huge victories this week by defeating Circleville 5-1 on Monday night, and then followed that up with an even bigger win over conference foe Jackson on Tuesday night in a 3-2 thriller.

In the non-conference win over Circleville, Paisley Pryor was the offensive catalyst for McClain scoring three first half goals for the hat trick.

It was a different story on Tuesday in the showdown with the Ironladies who have dominated girls’ soccer in the FAC over the last several seasons behind their senior all-league performer Sydney Carpenter who has been one of the premier players in the conference for four-years.

It was a defensive battle for the first twenty minutes of the opening half before Carpenter scored at the 20:30 mark for a 1-0 Jackson advantage, but McClain answered moments later on back-to-back goals by freshman Kayleigh Scott (16:59) and senior Addison Olaker (15:13) to take a 2-1 lead into halftime.

Both teams showed why they are two of the best in the FAC in the second half, showing so much energy and determination.

Junior Paisley Pryor gave the Lady Tigers a little breathing room with a goal at the 32:30 mark putting McClain ahead 3-1 but Carpenter answered with her second goal of the match at the 17:58 mark to pull Jackson back to within one at 3-2.

Neither team scored the rest of the match and both had several opportunities, but McClain keeper Leah Lovett and the Ironladies goalie played outstanding down the stretch preventing anymore scoring.

McClain improves to (7-1) on the season and have won seven in a row after an opening season loss at Unioto.

“Jackson has always had a really good team and program that is well-coached,” said McClain head coach Blain Bergstrom. “The Carpenter girl is really good and we tried everything tonight to slow her down some but she’s really talented and has some good players around her.

“Jackson is a senior-dominated team just like us, I think they have nine seniors like we do.

“This was a hard-fought game tonight, we got two goals early then played a little more defensively but still gave up a bad penalty kick goal, but those things happen in soccer. I thought defensively we played really hard and were able to run the clock down at the end and that’s what you have to do to win soccer games.”


“We’ve got another tough FAC game Thursday night at Miami Trace, hopefully we can play well and come out on top up there.”