Freshman Zoe Bell threw the soccer ball in bounds, watched it ping around a few times, then punished it with her right foot.<\/p>\n
She made sure there was no tie this time.<\/p>\n
Bell buried a shot into the back of the net with a swift, 30-yard strike in the 44th minute. Her go-ahead goal helped fourth-ranked Penn-Trafford rally past Franklin Regional, 2-1, in a Section 4-3A game on Monday night at Warrior Stadium.<\/p>\n
The teams played to a 1-1 draw in the section opener Aug. 31.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hit it perfect, and I knew the ball had good spin to it,\u201d Bell said. \u201cWe\u2019ve been put in a lot of positions where we\u2019ve had to come back to win. We found our feet.\u201d<\/p>\n
Section-leading Penn-Trafford (6-1-3, 5-0-2) moved to 3-0-2 at home this season as senior Kylee McClintock also had a goal on an assist from senior Lauryn Francis, an equalizer late in the first half.<\/p>\n
Frankin Regional (3-4-1, 3-3-1), which has lost four of five games \u2014 each by one goal \u2014 had momentum early and controlled play in the first half.<\/p>\n
Penn-Trafford struggled to clear the ball in the 26th minute, and the Panthers pounced as sophomore Reese Regelski scored in close to get the Panthers on the board first.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey play that four back (line), and it took us a little while to get used to it,\u201d Penn-Trafford coach Jimmy Mastroianni said. \u201cOur energy was low, and we started really slow. We played a better second half but overall, tonight wasn\u2019t our best.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Warriors won without standout sophomore Ellie Lebe scoring a goal. She was limited to one shot with senior back-liner Grace Copeland defending.<\/p>\n
Lebe had the tying goal in the 77th minute in the first meeting, literally seconds after Regelski scored for the Panthers.<\/p>\n
The Warriors\u2019 latest win left much to be desired from their coach.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think we played as a team tonight,\u201d Mastroianni said. \u201cOur communication needed to be better. I don\u2019t want us to play any more soccer tennis (back and forth).\u201d<\/p>\n
The Panthers started a new goalkeeper in sophomore Sofia Ramirez. She replaced junior Alaina McGrath, who sat out with leg soreness.<\/p>\n
Still, the Panthers managed six shots to Penn-Trafford\u2019s four but could not generate offense in the second half.<\/p>\n
Franklin Regional coach Scott Arnold said he was hoping his team would get a second goal before Penn-Trafford got its first.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have never seen something like this,\u201d Arnold said. \u201cWe played well tonight, we\u2019re playing well (overall) but that is four one-goal losses. That first half was one of the best first halves of soccer I have seen.<\/p>\n
\u201c(The second half) was a combination of situation and a little fatigue. They were raising a little more pressure, so we had to be patient.\u201d<\/p>\n
McClintock\u2019s goal, Arnold said, was a game-changer because it not only reset the score but gave the Warriors new hope.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was a very unfortunate goal,\u201d Arnold said. \u201cIt changed everything.\u201d<\/p>\n
Said Mastroianni: \u201cIt was huge.\u201d<\/p>\n
Francis created the scoring chance when she dribbled wide and crossed the ball in front. McClintock was there to touch it into the twine.<\/p>\n
Bell\u2019s laser shot for the Warriors\u2019 second goal would have gone in against a lot of teams, good or bad.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe did enough to come away with the win,\u201d Mastroianni said.<\/p>\n
Senior keeper Natalie Broadwater had fives saves for Penn-Trafford, which has outscored its section opponents 31-6.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Freshman Zoe Bell threw the soccer ball in bounds, watched it ping around a few times, then punished…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":913574,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,561,82],"class_list":["post-913573","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-soccer","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913573","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=913573"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913573\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/913574"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=913573"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=913573"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=913573"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}