Lindsey Roberts scored a goal and assisted on another in Thursday night’s soccer opener. (John Fisken photo)
It was a tale of two halves, at least scoring wise.
Sparked by the booming leg of sophomore defender Lindsey Roberts, the Coupeville High School girls’ soccer team jumped to a commanding lead Thursday against arch-rival South Whidbey.
But the pesky Falcons hung tough, scored two late goals (one aided by a questionable ref call) and somehow managed to force a 2-2 tie in the regular season opener.
With the game being a non-conference affair, the teams didn’t take their battle to overtime, instead accepting a draw.
Up until South Whidbey slipped in the tying goal with a little under five minutes left on the clock, the game seemed fairly lopsided in favor of the host Wolves.
Coupeville out-shot their visitors by a ton, but the scoring touch it showed in the first half slipped away a bit after the halftime break.
The Wolves continued to rain down shots, and had a golden opportunity to reclaim the lead, and probably a win, in the final seconds of injury time.
With the clock frozen and the game in the hands of the ref and his own personal watch, Lauren Bayne picked up a ball deep in Falcon territory and ripped a screaming shot.
Unfortunately, it was a little too hot, caught an updraft and flew through the football uprights for what would have been a beautiful field goal, letting South Whidbey off the hook.
The Falcons tied the game off of a free kick with 4:42 left in the game.
Or, actually, two free kicks.
The first one sailed wide left of the goal, but the ref called the ball back and allowed South Whidbey to set back up and try again.
No one was quite sure why, but the ultimate consensus was it had something to do with whether a whistle was blown, or not blown, or maybe the ref was just in a really forgiving mood.
Whatever the rationale, the Falcons took advantage and banged home the free kick, sending it into the upper left corner of the net, just a fraction too high for Wolf goalie Lauren Grove to snag.
Grove was solid all game, making several key saves, including one in which she speared the ball while leaping to touch the top of the net.
And, early on, the Wolves repaid her, hitting the back of the net twice in the first half.
Roberts, who has replaced the graduated Jenn Spark as having the most fearsome leg on the CHS roster, notched the year’s first goal 10 minutes in when she lashed a free kick from the far left side of the field.
Her shot curved nicely and hit pay dirt with the sound of a gun going off.
Then, at the 28 minute mark of the first half, Roberts once again earned screams of “Louuuuuuu” from her faithful fans when she whipped a shot into the middle, setting up Mia Littlejohn for a score.
The pass was a perfect set-up and the finish even better, as the junior caught the ball on her toe and perfectly angled the ball past the flailing goalie.
While the Wolves ultimately didn’t hold on to the lead, CHS coach Troy Cowan came away pleased with a lot of what he saw develop on the pitch.
“Overall, I was really happy,” he said. “For a first match, with several freshmen playing in key spots, I thought we played well.
“We’ll go back and make some adjustments and work on spacing in practice, but we out-shot them, by a lot, and we came away healthy, which you always like to see after the first match.”
Cowan hailed Roberts for her two-way play (she continually cleared the ball with passion in the backfield and hustled back to save Grove late in the game with a key deflection when the goalie got trapped outside the box).
He also lauded his freshmen.
All five ninth graders on the roster — Mallory Kortuem, Tia Wurzrainer, Avalon Renninger, Megan Thorn and Anna Dion — saw crucial field time.
“Mallory and Tia are new defenders and they started in their first match in a new system and really handled themselves well,” Cowan said. “That was very nice to see.”
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