Charlottesville High’s girls soccer team isn’t messing around when it comes to Jefferson District play. That’s the message the Black Knights delivered Thursday with a 5-0 victory over second place Monticello High.
Despite having wrapped up the regular season JD crown before entering last night’s tilt with the Mustangs, Charlottesville did a solid job of maintaining possession and took the momentum from a first half goal to a big second half, turning a 1-0 halftime advantage into a rout. But early in the contest, things weren’t exactly going Charlottesville’s way.
“We had to put more pressure on them,” said Charlottesville coach Fernando Opere. “(Early on) we were making too many bad passes and every bad pass is a ball for them to kick back. If we cut the number of balls that go to their feet, they have less opportunity and I think that happened. They didn’t have the same chances.”
With the speed Monticello has up front, turnovers in the midfield can be dangerous for the Mustangs’ opponents, but once Charlottesville cut out the errant passes and maintained possession, the tide shifted.
Abigail Intolubbe-Chmil scored that lone first half goal on a wild sequence. The Charlottesville striker initially drew Charlottesville keeper Deanna Ballard out on a run and deftly avoided a slide tackle by the goalie. Monticello defender Cary Wingo stepped in front of Intolubbe-Chmil and made a save, but the Charlottesville sophomore gathered the rebound and again ripped a shot that careened off Wingo again, then ricocheted off Ballard, who was scrambling back to the goal and tumbled out of her grasp into the net.
“I think we helped them a little bit with the early goals that were kind of fluky,” said Monticello coach Craig Brannan, who previously coached several CHS players in club soccer. “CHS hasn’t been uncomfortable yet and maybe in the tournament somebody can do something but there’s a lot of talent over there obviously and a lot of senior leadership.”
In the second half, Charlottesville’s dominance on possession led to a string of goals, first by Ellie Von Storch on another rebound. Von Storch’s most important contribution stretched beyond the goal. As she has for a couple of years, Von Storch owned the midfield, blasting the ball back into the offensive zone several times to prevent what appeared to be a budding Monticello run. Her consistent play helped Charlottesville overcome the early stretch where Opere felt like they weren’t executing, but she took it to a different level after the break.
“When you put her in the middle like we did at the half she’s dominant because she takes her time and she does whatever she wants with the ball,” Opere said.
Mary Hemmenway, Kelli Wisbauer and Grace Paine rounded out the scoring for Charlottesville. The Black Knights took a number of their 17 shots on goal from well outside the box, and Ballard proved up to the test on many of those blasts, coming up with 12 saves on the night. Her Charlottesville counterpart Emily Thomas made a pair of saves on just three total shots by Monticello, a product of the Black Knights’ dominance on possession.
Charlottesville faces one more obstacle to complete an unbeaten season in Jefferson District play — a road tilt with Fluvanna County. The Mustangs will try and bounce back when they face Louisa in their season finale Monday before entering Jefferson District tournament play late next week.
