SHELBYVILLE, Tenn. – After taking an early lead, the Shelbyville Central Golden Eaglettes (0-0-1) found an extremely late equalizer through Dara Frazier to secure a draw against the visiting Nolensville Knights (0-0-1) on Tuesday night, 2-2.

“We came into the season having key players to replace, and then one of our seniors tore her ACL, so we’re still working through that,” Shelbyville Central Head Coach Casey Curry said postgame, “For the most part, as a team, we’re working right now on our defensive shape. That was a little bit better in the second half.”

Kyler Doak opened the scoring for the Eaglettes with a breathtaking solo goal. Doak received the ball at midfield, glided past four defenders before calmly slotting the ball into the net past the Nolensville keeper to take a 1-0 lead in the sixth minute.

However, from then on, Nolensville grew into the game and began to control it through the midfield. The Knights began to dominate possession while the Eaglettes seemed content to try and hit them on the counter, and this led to a screamer of a goal for the visitors in the 29th minute.

Avery Bea, a sophomore, got the ball just outside the top of the box, found space, and delivered an absolute rocket into the top-left corner to bring Nolensville level at 1-1. That would remain the score at halftime.

“All three of our midfielders are new in terms of playing together. Their first goal, our whole midfield was flat instead of holding that triangle,” Curry explained, “On offense we’ll play with one defensive midfielder and two in front while in defense we’ll shift to two defensive and one a little more advanced. I think what happened is they all three dropped back and were flat and it gave her [Bea] space.”

Nolensville began the second half as the slightly better side, and the Knights were rewarded with a go-ahead goal in the 58th minute. Grace Schoen found space at the top of the box, and she smashed the ball past the keeper for the 2-1 lead.

Shelbyville Central had a wondrous opportunity to draw level in the 76th minute but was unable to score, but then Dara Frazier salvaged a draw with a goal two minutes later. Leila McFarland’s effort from inside the box was blocked, but the deflected ball fell right into the path of the onrushing Frazier who poked the ball home from six yards to draw level at 2-2.

Despite the draw, Curry sees a lot of room to improve from her dangerous attack.

“[Our front three] have got to learn how to play together,” she said, “If we’re going to make it as far as we want to, they’re going to have to play together. If we’re all in our defensive shape, then we can stay in our shape moving into attack, and then we have enough support for each other. We have really fast players, so we’re going to get one through ball. You can’t run away from the ball, you’ve got to check in and come short before looking for those chances to play the through.”

Both Nolensville and Shelbyville Central head to Gatlinburg this weekend to play in the Smoky Mountain Cup.