There’s always room for improvement.
After the Bainbridge High School varsity girls soccer team shut out the visiting Ingraham Rams Thursday night, head coach Mark Grindrod pulled his team together for a quick game recap.
With thoughts obviously turning toward homecoming festivities the following evening, one of the Spartan kickers chirped, “So, we’re not going to practice tomorrow, right?”
Grindrod shot back, “You think we don’t need to practice after a game like that?”
Several faces looked genuinely concerned, but then he broke into a smile and gave his team Friday off.
Despite the casual atmosphere on the Spartan sidelines, and the smiles up and down the field, the Bainbridge varsity team was all business, and simply overwhelmed the Rams — rarely giving up possession during the 80-minute tilt.
Six minutes into the game, junior Jenine Adam lofted a 30-yard shot over the outstretched arms of Rams keeper Jenice Geare for the first goal of the contest.
The Spartans continued the attack after taking the ball away from the Ingraham forwards, who were unable to gain ten feet of Bainbridge territory.
Courtney Bell blasted a hard, close-range shot that ricocheted off the Ingraham goalie and went wide for a Spartan corner kick. That kick ended up with the ball in Geare’s hands, but her subsequent clearing attempt upfield found nothing but white jerseys rushing the ball — a tactic Bainbridge would key on time and time again throughout the match.
Callan Cobb’s attempt on the next possession sailed high over the crossbar after Ram midfielder Jessica Dorn forced an early shot. The Rams got the ball as far as midfield before a steal and two Spartan passes found Lindsay Lund outrunning Ingraham’s Zena Leonard toward the net, requiring Geare to come out and play the bouncing ball.
Again, the visitors cleared to midfield, and again, the Spartans took possession and pressed forward. Bell worked her way around Zoe Wilson and hit the top right corner of the net to bring Bainbridge up by a pair of goals in the 28th minute.
The Ingraham defense regrouped after a Spartan offside call, but couldn’t contain a streaking Cobb, who put the shot off the goalkeeper’s hands and out of play.
The following Spartan corner kick saw a flurry of chances by Adriana Gonzalez-Medina and Bell, but Geare held her ground and finally dropped on top of the ball.
A Bainbridge corner kick popped out into midfield, right in front of Adam, who already had her foot cocked back. She rocketed the shot from 30 yards out for a
3-0 Spartan lead.
On the next play, Adam pushed a long pass ahead to Allie Picha, who was just ahead of the ball and couldn’t brake fast enough to control it.
The Spartans continued taking the ball from the Rams at midfield and passing back to senior Kyle McFarlane, who was constantly looking upfield for an open attacker.
McFarlane found Picha, who battled through Ingraham defender Tori Pickle and rushed at Geare, who scooped up the ball as Picha slid in at her feet.
In the 34th minute, the Rams finally found some time in the Bainbridge defensive zone, and sustained the pressure as Gonzalez-Medina hounded Ingraham’s Pickle relentlessly until Pickle finally kicked the ball out of bounds in frustration.
The second half began with a near Ingraham own-goal, as Pickle deflected a Bainbridge centering pass right into her keeper’s arms.
The Spartans went right back to work on the Ingraham defense when Adam, gunning for a hat trick, put a shot off the crossbar at 36:45. The Ingraham goalie snatched up the ball and booted it right to Gonzalez-Medina, who ran it in wide and popped a shot across the goal mouth.
In the fifth minute, a scramble in front of the Ingraham goal put the ball on the business end of Lund’s foot, who found the back of the net for a 4-0 Bainbridge lead.
The next Spartan attack came on a Zena Hemmen steal — Hemmen brought the ball in from midfield and hit the crossbar on a hard shot as Ingraham’s keeper came out to cut down the angle.
Again, the Rams were unable to move the ball past midfield, as McFarlane snapped up the Ingraham keeper’s kicks out of the box.
A Gonzalez-Medina cross to a running Picha brought a full-speed Spartan two-on-one into the Ingraham zone, and Picha freight-trained into the Rams goalie in her shot on goal.
After a brief delay while the Ingraham netminder cleared her head, the Spartan offense came back running. But Gonzalez-Medina’s goal at 25:09 was called offside as the twine bulged behind the still-shaken Rams goaltender.
A Picha-to-Tucker Huget passing series found Kara Mann, who kicked a field goal high over the Rams net, and Gonzalez-Medina clanked a shot off the right post.
The Rams, looking somewhat helpless, and hapless against the Spartan attack, became frustrated. Defender Zoe Wilson barked at the referee after what she considered a Spartan push-off, and received a yellow-card for the outburst.
The following Bainbridge corner kick by Cobb found Gonzalez-Medina, who bounced the ball into the net with a dead-on header, bringing the score to 5-0.
With 6:45 left, Cobb hit a shot from 25-yards out on the left side, and at just over two minutes left in the game, a Spartan corner kick turned into a manic pinball frenzy in front of the net. Picha reined in the ball and punched it by the Rams keeper for the final score — 7-0.
“The girls did what they were supposed to do,” said Grindrod of the easy win. “There was a lot of good, smart passing.”
Spartan goalkeepers Catherine Powers and Callie Tift combined for the shutout.
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***C-team drops Ingraham 5-1
The Bainbridge High School girls C- team defeated Ingraham 5-1 Thursday night. Spartan goals were scored by Roxie Cosser, Ryan McDonald, Heather Schuler, Lindsay White and Lindsay Mynatt.
