When Bethlehem and Shenendehowa met in Tuesday’s Suburban Council girls soccer showdown, both teams were playing their third game in four days.
Bethlehem handled the strain better than Shen did.
Becca Lee and Megan Olsen scored in the first overtime to lift the Lady Eagles to a 2-0 victory over Shen in Bethlehem.
It was a typical Shen-Bethlehem game. They always go down to the wire, said Bethlehem coach Tom Rogan.
`Very rarely do I try to find excuses, but this was our third game in four days with only one day rest,` said Shen coach Holli Mulholland. `I think fatigue affected us.`
The Lady Eagles (6-0) took numerous shots in regulation, but couldn’t get on the scoreboard until Lee lofted a direct kick over Kim Elsworth’s hands and into the goal less than two minutes into the first overtime period.
`I was down there with her looking at the angle she had,` Rogan said of Lee’s shot, which came from the right sideline. `I told her if you think you have the angle, take it. She struck it well. When you strike a (soccer) ball well, it has no spin, and that ball had no spin.`
Meanwhile, Shen (5-1) had trouble getting quality scoring chances. The Plainswomen’s best opportunity came with less than 12 minutes left in regulation. Ashleigh Barone broke into the penalty box and struck a hard shot that bounced off the left goalpost and into Bethlehem goalkeeper Kiersten Swete’s hands.
`We joked on the bench and said our keeper played the angle perfectly,` said Rogan.
Barone’s miss sparked Shen’s offense, but only for six minutes. The Plainswomen had a corner kick and two free kicks during that span, but Bethlehem weathered the storm and started counterattacking.
`For moments there, it was a quick transition game,` said Mulholland. `Our front third was attacking, and then their front third was attacking.`
Eventually, though, Bethlehem was doing all the attacking. After Lee’s goal, the Lady Eagles kept the pressure on Shen’s defense until Olsen scored off a pass from Kristina Maksuti with 30 seconds left in the first overtime.
The Plainswomen tried to muster an attack in the second overtime period, but Bethlehem’s defense broke up pass after pass to prevent them from getting on the scoreboard ` a rarity for a team that averaged more than four goals a game entering Tuesday’s contest.
`No goals in 100 minutes says it all,` said Rogan. `The five kids back there did a great job.“