Sporting Club Jacksonville continued to show exactly why they are top of the league as they defeated Fort Lauderdale United in their fourth and final regular season matchup.<\/p>\n
The 4-1 win saw some quick and immediate action from Baylee DeSmit, who is one goal away from a double-digit goal-scoring season following her goals in the 14th and 51st minute.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m not one to focus on the stats, but it\u2019s cool to know that I\u2019m approaching a milestone, she said. \u201cI think for the rest of the season though, we just want to keep the consistency and play how we know we need to play, which is something we do well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another milestone was hit Saturday night for Meg Hughes after Paige Kenton capitalized on a well-placed ball, leading to another goal for Kenton, giving her double-digits in goals this season and boosting Hughes to a three-way tie in league-leading assists alongside Kenton and Ashlyn Puerta.<\/p>\n
After clinching a first-place spot in the playoffs in last Saturday\u2019s 2-0 win against Brooklyn FC, the team continues to look forward to each match, while still staying focused on the true goal.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are not thinking about the playoffs at this point,\u201d said Stacey Balaam, the Sporting JAX women\u2019s head coach. \u201cWe set a target to make it there at the end of the season, and we can proudly acknowledge that achievement. However, there is still so much to play for, and staying at the top is the next goal for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
With five regular season games to go, the team heads to the West Coast in their upcoming match on April 19 to face Spokane Zephyr FC for their last regular season meetup, hoping to come home from this road trip with three points in the bag.<\/p>\n
Men\u2019s Team<\/p>\n
The Sporting JAX men dropped a narrow 1-0 decision to Detroit City FC on Saturday in front of 5,000 fans in the Motor City with an early set-piece goal proving to be the difference.<\/p>\n
Goalkeeper Christian Olivares was the standout performer, delivering save after save to keep Sporting JAX in the match.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe goalkeeper kept us in the game \u2014 he was loud; I love that from behind me,\u201d said Captain Ryan Edwards.<\/p>\n
Head Coach Liam Fox added that Olivares is \u201ca young kid with a really high ceiling.\u201d<\/p>\n
Edgardo Rito made his club debut in the 57th minute and quickly made an impact, recording a shot on goal and providing an attacking spark.<\/p>\n
Fox said, \u201cHe has an impact when he comes on; he\u2019ll be an important player for us moving forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
Despite sitting at 0-5-1, the resolve in the group remains strong.<\/p>\n
Fox\u2019s message is consistent. \u201cWe can\u2019t feel sorry for ourselves. They come in every week strong, and they are improving.\u201d<\/p>\n
The club turns the page quickly, playing on the road again next Saturday, April 18, vs Louisville City FC.<\/p>\n
\u2014 Submitted by Sporting JAX Communications<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sporting Club Jacksonville continued to show exactly why they are top of the league as they defeated Fort…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":234797,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[249,251,250],"class_list":["post-234796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=234796"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234796\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/234797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}