By DAVID MILLER
Special to The Dispatch
With a missed penalty kick and potential go-ahead goal on her record, New Hope midfielder Effie Morrison started to crash the Center Hill 18-yard box as fellow senior Samantha Vogel won a 50-50 ball and dribbled up the left edge of the box.
The pair had connected for plenty of goals throughout their seven years of varsity ball together, so surely they’d find a way to break a 2-2 tie in the 75th minute and send the Lady Trojans to the Class 5A North State title game for the second consecutive year, right?
The lack of concentration that led to Morrison shanking a penalty kick off the left iron in the 65th was regained when she went airborne and first-timed Vogel’s well-placed cross across the face of goal and from just outside the 6-yard box.
The Lady Trojans went ahead 3-2 before Madison Thrasher added an insurance goal in the 79th for a 4-2 win and a spot against Germantown in the 5A North State game Tuesday night.
“I knew I was gonna kill it,” Morrison said. “I felt it coming in, thinking ‘Sam’s gonna get it to me, she always does.’ I was thinking, ‘should I do a diving header or use my feet?’ I waited for it to get a little bit closer, and I was nowhere near able to dive for it, so I used my feet.”
While Morrison will likely rue the missed penalty kick – and a chance at a hat trick – she left the field satisfied with two of New Hope’s four goals, including a penalty she both won and scored in the 35th minute to give the Lady Trojans a 2-1 lead.
New Hope (8-4-1) enjoyed lengthy spells of possession after a shaky 15 minutes to open the game, mixing together physical and sure-footed play in the middle through Morrison and Sydney Brocksmith, and speedy wing play from Alyssa Corbett, Anna Kate O’Bryant and Vogel. And, as New Hope coach Mary Nagy scripted it, the inside-out play they’d practiced throughout the week and before the game worked to perfection – the game-winner was scored on a cross, as was the game-opener, a ground cross from Vogel on the right flank to O’Bryant, who calmly re-directed the ball with her left foot.
“We knew, with Center Hill playing four defenders, we wouldn’t be able to do what we typically do, offensively,” Nagy said. “So we worked on taking the ball to the line and cross the ball back across the box – every day, even as we warmed up today. But credit the players because they were focused an executed two really good plays.”
Morrison led all scorers with two goals, while Vogel had two assists.
Center Hill (10-10) turned the game on its ear – twice – despite being out-matched physically and often wasting quality midfield play by Annie Chan, Hannah Sullivan and Caitlin Barnes by breaking down in the final third. Just one minute after O’Bryant’s opener, Parker Tomlinson scored to tie the game. And, just five minutes after Morrison missed a penalty kick, Barnes beat New Hope goalkeeper MacKenzie Harvey, who’d left her mark to gather the ball.
“It could have been a big momentum shift,” Nagy said. “Since Effie and Sam and Abby (Wilson) were seventh graders, they’ve been a part of playoff teams. This is the oldest team we’ve had here. Experience is a huge asset to us that we typically don’t have. They don’t let goals get them down. You can see a little deflation when it happens, but they have a lot of character and they dig deep.
“That experience really helps us.”
Morrison said the team didn’t get to scout Center Hill, but they’d heard from other players and coaches that Chan, a wing player, would pose the biggest threat, mainly through speed and crosses.
“She got a couple off, but outside of that she didn’t do much today,” Morrison said of Chan.
As the pace of the game grew more frantic and players became more aggressive, Chan found herself switched from the right side to the left, where she was matched up against fullback Thrasher, a taller player with whom she’d have a speed advantage against.
“When they put her in, I knew I’d have to keep up with her,” Thrasher said. “And I’m obviously not as teeny tiny as she is, so I was struggling the last 20 minutes. I’m gonna get heavy legs every game anyway, so I couldn’t think about it.”
Thrasher’s work rate, which saw her defend and advance forward to link with midfield, was rewarded in the 79th when she latched on to a loose ball and rifled a low shot from more than 25 yards out, which skipped over a diving Morgan Atkins to officially seal the game for New Hope.
“My coaches, all the time, tell me ‘take those shots! Take those shots! They’re gonna go in if you take them,'” Thrasher said. “And they were right. It was such a relief, after busting my butt up and down that sideline, to get that goal.”
n In the North State Class 4A playoffs, the Caledonia boys soccer team saw its season end with a 2-1 shootout loss at Corinth.
The Confederates finish 16-7-2.
The Dispatch Editorial Board is made up of publisher Peter Imes, columnist Slim Smith, managing editor Zack Plair and senior newsroom staff.
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