Eaglettes drop shocker in 8-AAA soccer tourney

Tuesday, October 20, 2009
By Gary Johnson

Lauren Warren runs through the ball against a Lawrence County defender at midfield.
(T-G Photo by Jimmy Jones)
[Click to enlarge] [Order this photo]

It was a good night for the visiting underdogs as both lower seeds advanced to the finals Monday in the District 8-AAA Soccer Tournament.

Top seed Tullahoma was edged 2-1 by Columbia while second seed Shelbyville Central was shut out 1-0 by Lawrence County in overtime.

It's the first time that Shelbyville or Tullahoma didn't advance to the district championship.

"This is a statement that our district is becoming more balanced," Shelbyville coach Neal Gordon said. "The two lower seeds advanced in the boys district tournament last spring as well."

The game was scoreless at the end of regulation and the winning goal came off the foot of Carla Gross with slightly over three minutes left in the first 10 minute overtime.

The Eaglettes (8-6-1) fired off 11 shots on goal compared to Lawrence County's three and had a 7-1 advantage on corner kicks.

Senior goalkeeper Shelby Lamb realizes she has played her last game as an Eaglette after an upset loss ended their season on Monday night.
(T-G Photo by Jimmy Jones) [Click to enlarge] [Order this photo]
"We did everything we could except find the back of the net," Gordon said. "We had a number of good shots but they just didn't fall for us. If any one of those shots go in I think that would have been enough to win the game.

"Sometimes you can beat the team but you can't win the game and tonight we struggled with beating the game."

Shelbyville rolled to a 5-0 win at Lawrence County's Senior Night and that was all the motivation the Lady Wildcats needed.

"Their coach told me after the game that his girls were embarrassed by that loss and they thought they were a better team than they showed that night," Gordon said. "They entered this game with a lot of desire and they played that way. I give them credit. They played extremely well on defense, their keeper made a lot of saves and the longer they were able to stay in the game the more determined they got."

Shelbyville closed out the first half with a pair of great scoring opportunities that just missed the goal.

"Lawrence County played the type of pressure that created a lot of mistakes in our passing and I think that was one of the keys to their victory," Gordon said. "They created so much pressure that it forced us to make bad passes and we didn't keep our composure under that pressure.

"I hate for it to end this way for our seniors because they have been good senior leaders for us all year and I know we'll miss them. We do have a lot of young kids coming back that got a lot of playing time this year and we're really looking forward to next year."

Comments

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I just wanted to let you know there are several mistakes in your story. It was a double overtime game. Lawrence County lost in regular season by a score of 4-0, not 5-0. Lawrence County also had more than 1 corner kick during the game. I realize this is a hometown team, but very poor reporting on your end. A PROUD Lawrence County parent.

-- Posted by jtsbaker on Tue, Oct 20, 2009, at 11:34 AM

jtsbaker.... he was kind enough to leave out the fact that Lawrenceburg scored on a VERY questionable goal where they were clearly offside. It was hard for SCHS to beat 12 players out there. The officials were the worse that I have seen.

-- Posted by sameoldstory on Tue, Oct 20, 2009, at 2:55 PM

That being said, I want to congratulate SCHS on a good season. They had a young team and will learn alot from their mistakes.

-- Posted by sameoldstory on Tue, Oct 20, 2009, at 2:59 PM

Great job Lady Cats!!! I also want to say great job to Carla. New Jersey's loss is Tennessee's gain. We sure do miss you up here. I hope you guys down there realize how lucky you are to have Carla playing for you. She's a great team player with heart and never gives up.

-- Posted by rmm1717 on Tue, Oct 20, 2009, at 3:04 PM

sameoldstory... the referee consulted his assistant after he saw his flag raised, which was flagged because of a foul on the crosser who set up the goal. did you forget the rule where you are never offside if you're behind the ball when it's played, as was the case with the goalscorer?

taking nothing away from shelbyville, who created numerous chances throughout the game and played very hard, they had 100 minutes to score and failed to do so. don't blame the referee for poor finishing along with an "offside" goal.

-- Posted by manutd on Tue, Oct 20, 2009, at 6:34 PM

Anyone who was at the game knows the referee did an absolute terrible job! Agreed ,the goal was very questionable yet it was still a goal. Scoring in 100 minutes sounds pretty easy considering we beat yall 4 to 0 in 80. However, it's a little hard to do when the ref blows his whistle every time we had a scoring opportunity! oh well, guess we'll see how well yall stack up against 7aaa. Should be a good game..haha

-- Posted by schs2013 on Fri, Oct 23, 2009, at 3:13 PM