Neuqua Advances To Title Game

One of the few things girls soccer program has yet to achieve is winning the Invitational.

The nation’s top team will get that shot Saturday.

After being shut out in the first half for the first time all season, Neuqua put away a pair of second-half goals to take down Geneva, 2-0, in the tournament semifinals.

The Wildcats earned a date with a powerful Lyons team in Saturday’s 1 p.m. finals. The Lions knocked off defending state champion Waubonsie Valley, 1-0, in the other semifinal.

“I have a bunch of friends on that team that I play with on my club team, and I know them well,” UCLA-bound senior Megan Oyster said of Lyons, who is now 14-2-1. “They’re good players and they’re definitely going to give us something to play against. It will be a challenge.”

For a team that moved to 16-0 on the season with eight shutouts, the first half was a rare time of frustration for the Wildcats. They had scored at least one goal in the first half of every match this season, but were unable to crack the scorebook on their first three shots on goal Friday against Geneva (8-4-4).

“We were all really frustrated at the half,” Oyster said. “All of us were talking about how to calm down and play our game because we were frustrated and we weren’t capitalizing on our opportunities. Once we finally did, we relaxed and we were able to play our game better.”

It took a direct kick from Oyster with 34:05 left in the second half to kick-start the offense. She tried to score on the ground by kicking around the Vikings’ wall, but as it started to go wide, sophomore Gianna Dal Pozzo came streaking in to put the goal away.

“I thought it was going on goal, but I thought it may be going wide, so I figured I’d tap it,” Dal Pozzo said.

Both that goal and senior Allie McBride’s score off a Shannon Pimmel feed with 29:10 left came off of impressive runs without the ball.

“We always learn to follow through with the play no matter what, even if I’m shooting it,” Oyster said. “We try to have players in the box all the time and we did, and we capitalized on that.”

The Wildcats have an impressive four players with double-digit goals already this season, Dal Pozzo, McBride and Oyster, along with sophomore Zoey Goralski. Alexa Wilde isn’t too far off the pace, either.

Goralski missed her third game of the season, and second in a row, while fulfilling her duties as a member of the U16 national team.

“She may or may not be back in time for our game tomorrow,” Neuqua coach Joe Moreau said. “Her flight is in the morning. She may make it. Maybe that 40-mile per hour wind will be a tailwind. You can’t pass that opportunity up.”