Hawks do everything but score
Girls soccer: Horizon Christian plays strong as it battles Gervais to a 0-0 tie
DAN BROOD / The Times
ON THE RUN — Horizon Christian High School junior Micah Schuler (right) stays ahead of Gervais’ Katy Isisordia as they race for the ball in Monday’s match.
TUALATIN — In its league opener, the Horizon Christian High School girls soccer team turned in what could easily be called an impressive performance.
The Hawks created scoring opportunity after scoring opportunity.
They turned up the defensive pressure all over the field. They definitely seemed to control the action from start to finish.
But there’s just one thing they weren’t quite able to do – knock the ball in the goal.
So, despite their dominating performance the Hawks had to settle for a 0-0 tie with Gervais in a District 4 league opener played Monday at Horizon Christian High School.
“That’s OK. I thought we did really well today,” Horizon Christian freshman defender/ midfielder Lizzie Ng said after the match. “Our goal today was to play with desire, and we did that.”
Gervais moved to 5-0-1 on the season with the tie while the Hawks moved to 2-1-1.
“We’re excited with how we’re playing,” Horizon Christian coach Corey Hand said. “We still have a couple girls injured, and we should get them back soon. This definitely was a promising start to league.”
Horizon Christian, in Monday’s match, seemed to threaten to score the whole way. The Hawks had a close call less than three minutes into the contest when a turnaround shot by junior Sarah Brucker sailed just left of the Gervais goal.
Brucker also had the final shot for the Hawks. Her running attempt from 25 yards out flew just barely over the crossbar of the Cougar goal as the final horn sounded.
“That was so close,” Hand said.
Horizon Christian also had plenty of other opportunities in between those two shots by Brucker.
“We’re getting better and better every day,” Ng said. “It’s been fun getting in there and stepping up.”
Freshman Maggie Bachhuber, senior Victoria Holmes, freshman Sammy Mullen and Ng all had shots at the Gervais goal in the first half.
In addition to Brucker’s last-second attempt, Horizon Christian came extremely close to scoring during another instance in the second half. With 21 minutes and 49 seconds left in the match, Horizon Christian senior Deanna Ulrich had her shot from 17 yards out clank off the left post of the Cougar goal. Junior Candice Russell’s follow-up shot went just wide right of the goal.
Ng, Bachhuber and Mullen also had shots on goal for the Hawks in the second half.
Meanwhile, the Horizon Christian defense, including freshman Renee Rosal, Ng, sophomore Gracie Dempster, Bachhuber and sophomore goalkeeper Tessa Williams among others, didn’t allow Gervais to get a shot on goal in the contest.
“We have some great girls on defense,” Hand said.
Horizon Christian was scheduled to play at Western Mennonite in a league match on Wednesday. Results of that match weren’t available when the Times went to press.
The Hawks will be back in action Monday when they host Philomath at 4:15 at Horizon Christian High School.