Two weeks removed from a 7-1 beating at the hands of Center Grove, Columbus East girls soccer coach Ilya Schwartzman decided to take a different approach in Saturday night’s Class 3A sectional championship match.
The Olympians took a much more defensive approach, hoping to keep the explosive Trojans off the scoreboard — and for 58 minutes, it worked. But the dominant side eventually won out, with Alainna Frankel’s second-half tally all that eighth-ranked Center Grove needed in a 1-0 victory.
With the win, the Trojans (16-2-1) advance to the Bloomington South Regional, where they’ll take on the host Panthers in a semifinal match at noon Saturday.
"They definitely were a little stiffer down the spine," Center Grove coach Mike Bishop said. "Made it difficult for us to operate. We had a good game plan going; we just couldn’t execute as well as we would have liked. But we were on in spots and gutted out a 1-0 win. I’ll take whatever I can get at this point."
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The Trojans dominated the opening half, steadily maintaining possession and keeping the ball in the Olympians’ end for almost all of the first 40 minutes. But truly potent scoring chances were hard to come by, as the visitors managed to stonewall most of Center Grove’s attempts to get inside the 18-yard line.
Paige Waskom was responsible for the Trojans’ two best opportunities before intermission. The first was a cross from the right side to in front of the goal that got redirected by Macy Detty but saved by Columbus East goaltender Karisma Parker. The second was a hard Waskom shot to the left side of the net that Parker was just able to dive and knock away. Center Grove had 12 shots, six of them on goal, to the Olympians’ one in the first half but nothing to show for that wide disparity.
The pressure increased after the break. Center Grove put five shots on goal in the first 10 minutes of the second half, including a one-timer from Emily Karr that Parker had to lunge to tap over the crossbar. The Columbus East senior finished her night with 16 saves.
Finally, with 21:54 remaining in the match, the Columbus East defense cracked. Peyton Murphy’s corner kick made it through to the far post, where a crashing Frankel put it home to get the Trojans on the board. It was the team’s 25th shot of the night.
"Peyton’s corners are always very long," Frankel said, "so I was like, ‘Somebody needs to go back post.’ I saw Paige coming in and I thought she had the header, and when it came in I was like, ‘It’s going to be too high,’ so I just tried to finish it and hoped for the best."
Columbus East (11-5-2) finally started getting more of a push forward in the final seven minutes as desperation started to sink in, but all of their shot attempts either sailed wide of the goal or bounced harmlessly to Trojan goalie Kelti Wise.
Center Grove finished with a 30-5 advantage in overall shots — and while only one found the back of the net, that was enough to move on.
"We have a week just to recover and get our legs back," Bishop said. "At this time of the year, all the little nicks and dings are adding up, and everyone’s tired, but we’re on fall break, so we can rest and relax and kind of let the kids be kids for a bit. Come out and train, and get ready to go for Saturday."
