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Girls soccer: Lady Lions bounce back with wins
By Justin Thomas, jthomas@starlocalnews.com
After suffering consecutive losses to two of the top four teams in District 6-5A (Colleyville Heritage and Euless Trinity), R.L. Turner's girls soccer team bounced back with a pair of wins to firm up their playoff positioning in District 6-5A.
The Lady Lions (6-3) head into Friday's showdown against Grapevine (9-0) three games back of the Lady Mustangs and one game behind the Lady Trojans (7-2), but are in front of the Lady Panthers (3-3-3) by virtue of earning wins instead of draws.
"A playoff spot is looking pretty good," said Drew Maher, Turner head coach. "We're winning the matches we are supposed to. Right now, we're three clear of Colleyville, but they've already played Grapevine twice. [Colleyville is] a really good team, they are just hot and cold, as evidenced by their three draws but then beating us 3-0."
"The three after the break are going to be really big for us," Maher added.
On Feb. 26, Turner got past Irving MacArthur, 4-1, and followed with a 3-0 result Friday over Irving Nimitz.
"The MacArthur match was interesting," Maher said. "We were up, 2-0, with 20 minutes left and they weren't really challenging us. So we put a lot of our reserves in and with seven minutes left they had a freak counter attack and scored on us. So it got a little tight, and then all of the sudden we scored twice in the last seven minutes to win 4-1."
Hanna Barker, who will be absent from Friday's match against Grapevine, paced the offense with a hat trick, while Claudia Rojas also scored.
"One of Hanna's goals really stood out," Maher said. "She is left-footed and Ariana Arevalo made a long pass that Hanna just plucked out of the air with her right foot and blasted in 1-2 real quickly."
Rojas then tacked on the final goal with a one-timer off a throw-in.
Barker again led the way in the win over Nimitz with a pair of scores, while Guadalupe Cortez contributed a goal.
"We had only beaten them 4-3 in our first match," Maher said. "So that was a big boost for us. And we hadn't had a clean sheet in district yet, so that was our No. 1 goal: to put a zero up there. It felt good to take care of business and get that done."
Goalie Nicole Ellis wasn't tested often but did come up with a 1-on-1 stop to preserve the shutout.
Maher said Turner's third goal was one of the nicest team goals he's seen since taking over the Lady Lions.
Starting with a free kick, the score featured eight seconds of build up with four passes and concluded with Cortez chipping the ball over the goalie's head.
"We don't score a whole lot on set pieces, so that was nice to see," Maher added.
With her pair of goals, Barker now has 26 on the season to go with 15 assists, while Rojas has 15 goals and 10 assists.
"That's been the biggest difference this year," Maher said. "We have another player up top that can really put goals in and create along with Hanna."
Maher was also pleased the Turner offense didn't let up despite setting a defensive-oriented goal.
"We knew if we kept a clean sheet, we would get at least one in," he said. "So to get three was nice. And I think the shutout is really going to give our keeper more confidence."
The Lady Lions have also benefitted from changing Yanneli Diaz to marking back with Kelsey Gomez taking care of the right side.
"They're able to stay with forwards and that's made a big difference," Maher said. "If we can defend, we can challenge anyone, because we get consistent offense."
Boys soccer: Turner alone in second
Turner's boys team is also cruising along, as the Lions (6-1-3) sit in second behind Irving Nimitz (8-0-2) with just one loss on their resume.
On Friday, Turner had a chance to cut into the Vikings' district lead but instead played Nimitz to a scoreless draw.
The squad followed with a draw on Monday as well, playing even against L.D. Bell, 2-2.
Previously, the team distanced itself from Trinity on Feb. 22 with a 2-1 margin over the Trojans (5-4-1) to take a commanding lead of second.
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