St. Vincent girls soccer team ends Kelly's first varsity season

PERRYVILLE, Mo. -- Monday's Class 1 girls soccer district semifinal at the Perryville Soccer Complex was a matchup between one school extremely familiar with postseason play and another longing to reach those heights.

St. Vincent earned a trip to Wednesday's district final with a 2-0 victory over Kelly, a program that, with the loss, concluded its first season of varsity competition.

The Indians (13-10), who will be playing in the district title game for the third time in the past four seasons, face Saxony Lutheran at 6 p.m. Wednesday in Perryville. The Crusaders defeated Carnahan 10-0 in the day's first game. Kelly finished its inaugural season at 7-12-1.

"I'm very proud," Kelly coach Lance Powers said. "First varsity season, I can't complain. St. Vincent's a quality team. We [beat] them in the regular season [on penalty kicks] and we knew they were going to come back and it would be a very tough game, and it was. Hats off to them. They played very well tonight."

St. Vincent used a first-half goal from freshman Jenna Winkler to take an early lead. Winkler curled a free kick from just outside the penalty box on the left side into the far corner of the net, just over the outstretched arm of Kelly goalkeeper Shanda Reed at the 21-minute, 51-second mark.

"I was hoping [it would go in]," Winkler said. "I knew where I wanted to put it, but I was just wishing it would go in."

Winkler also sparked several other scoring chances for the Indians with her corner kicks, but Kelly's defense -- and the play of Reed in goal -- were up to the task, and the Indians led just 1-0 at halftime.

But the scoring chances came fast and furious in the second half. St. Vincent senior Courtney Brown barely whiffed on heading a high cross at the 31-minute mark. Then, at 28:44, the Indians' Kylie Baer headed a cross toward the goal that was blocked back to Lauren Carron, who footed it into the upper corner of the net to put the Indians up 2-0.

"It was perfectly set up by Kylie," Carron said. "It was a perfect header, right in front of the goal, and all I did was lifted it. It was a team effort."

St. Vincent first-year coach Caitlin Pistorio was happy to see her team attack offensively in the second half, even though their efforts netted the Indians just one goal.

"The first half, we didn't have as many offensive opportunities as I would have liked," Pistorio said after her squad managed just six shots on goal over the first 40 minutes. "But the second half, we just came out with guns blazing. It's nice to have a game like that, especially the first round of districts."

Pistorio admitted her squad needed a boost after losing to the Hawks during the regular season.

"You can never go into a game too confident," she said. "I think we came out that way in the beginning, and it was just a reminder that we can lose at a moment's notice. That, and as soon as you get that second goal you always have a sigh of relief of, 'OK, now we're alright, let's just play our game.'"

Reed kept the Hawks in the game with her stellar play in goal. The Indians had a chance to pad their lead even more but Reed kept denying them, either swallowing up long shots on goal or tipping several point-blank opportunities just wide.

"I give her all the credit in the world," Pistorio said about Reed. "We put almost every shot that we had right on goal, and she was there."

"She's all-district, and she showed it," Powers said. "We're going to miss her. Big shoes to fill next year."

Reed was simply happy to set a standard for future Hawks teams to meet or exceed.

"We were the bottom dogs, and we beat some really good teams out there," Reed said about the historic season. "To come out there and have a decent record, and have the third seed in districts, I'm really proud of us being a first-year varsity team."

Pistorio knows what lies ahead as her squad next faces Saxony, a team they lost a tight 1-0 match to just last week.

"I think the girls are fired up," Pistorio said. "Part of the trouble we had from last week to this week was keeping them focused on one game at a time. I think as soon as we stepped off the field last week against Saxony we wanted to go right back out there. Our girls are fired up. They're ready to go."