As far as debuts go, Kelsey Brownriggs’ has been about as good as anyone could ask for. After being called up from junior varsity last week, the Charlottesville freshman scored a pair of goals in her team’s Jefferson District quarterfinal win over Goochland.
On Tuesday in the semifinals, she replicated that performance against Fluvanna County in a game where the Flucos outplayed the Black Knights, but Charlottesville came away with a 3-2 win.
“We played a terrible game, we did not play well,” said Black Knights coach Fernando Opere. “But (Kelsey) has been amazing. The other day she scored two goals, today she scored two more. It’s welcome.”
For the first 10 minutes of the game, Charlottesville and Fluvanna battled back and forth at midfield. But Fluvanna ended the relatively short scoreless period when Taylor Dean got her foot on a loose ball already just a foot away from the net and tapped it in.
The Black Knights answered back five minutes later with a breakaway goal from Brownrigg.
Almost 20 minutes passed between the contest’s next goal. Fluvanna recaptured the lead on when Tyler Drake broke loose and finished a fast break. However, just like earlier in the half, Charlottesville answered right back just a few minutes later when Julia Bray scored on a broken play in front of the Flucos’ net.
Fluvanna started the second half by applying plenty of pressure, and when Charlottesville was able to transition into a fast break, Alyson Peino made the play of the game defensively as she stopped a shot from Abigail Intolubbe−Chmil who had beaten goalkeeper Emily Brown.
The Flucos continued to keep Charlottesville in its defensive end, but Zoe Ackerman and Ellen Buckley limited the Fluvanna opportunities to just a few corners and odd shots on net.
“I thought it was a high pressure game for us and the girls came out fighting,” said Flucos coach Tara Garcia. “I feel like we could have won that game and should have won that game, we were just unlucky. We had to finish the chances we had.”
The Black Knights took off on another breakaway with just over 12 minutes to play, but Brown stood strong in net and came up with a crucial save. From that point forward, it was Charlottesville putting the pressure on. And with five minutes left, Brownrigg struck again off of a crossing pass that was initially broken up.
“Abby hit (the ball) and it went to the middle,” Brownrigg said. “I just hit it with the inside of my foot and it went in.”
The Black Knights head to the championship game where they’ll meet Western Albemarle.
