Albemarle’s girls soccer team was coming out just a touch flat in the second half of some early season games.
So they decided to bring their own soundtrack.
“We picked a song all of us are familiar with and we know all the words to so we can dance around to it during halftime,” said Albemarle senior Madeline St. Amand. “It’s a way to not get us completely relaxed, to keep us engaged and excited. I think that’s helped us to start the second half with more momentum.”
With Olivia Rodrigo’s breakup anthem good 4 u cranked up on the sideline through coach Amy Sherrill’s rolling speaker, the Patriots found a jolt of energy to start the second half Tuesday night. That helped Albemarle hold off a renewed effort from rival Western Albemarle in the second half and pick up a 2-0 road victory over the Warriors, the Patriots’ first win in Crozet since 2017 and the seniors’ first career win against Western on the road.
“This is such a good team that Western has, so much firepower on offense, to hold them to a few chances and the defense and our goalie being able to keep the shutout, it’s huge,” Sherrill said. “We work on things in practice and obviously it translated right into today.”
Albemarle got a big lift early when St. Amand set up sophomore Devon Higginbottom for a goal just four minutes into the match and St. Amand also set up fellow senior Katie Manley for a second half goal with 16:54 left that really put the Warriors in a hole. The Patriots’ familiarity and experience played a big role in getting that fast start early — several key players have been in a lot of these battles.
“We have a really, really close knit team,” St. Amand said. “Having an abundance of upperclassmen involved in the offense that have experienced four years of this and know what it’s like. It’s also nice to have underclassmen who are so ready and willing and wanting to learn. They’re easy to lead.”
The match was physical even by the standards of this fierce rivalry between two programs that regularly compete for state championships. Western couldn’t find an equalizer in part because the Patriots stayed in attack mode most of the rest of the first half. Western finally managed to create some late chances before the break, but senior Sydney Alexander held up in goal en route to the shutout. Alexander does some of her best work helping the Albemarle defense stay in positon to prevent good chances from even happening in the first place.
“She’s our vocal leader in the back, she sees everything in front of her and tells us what she sees, for her to continue to talk all game long is super important,” Sherrill said. “I’m pumped that she’s leading us between the pipes.”
With Alexander navigating the back end, Albemarle managed to keep probing and testing an experienced Western defense led by UMBC-bound Catherine Domecq. The Warriors held up for the most part, but struggled to transition the ball back up into the attacking half as Albemarle’s midfielders pressed and made things difficult on Western’s central group. That left Western defending against what seemed like a barrage of attacks from the Albemarle defense.
“We talked about how when you play good teams like Albemarle is, you’re going to get a few opportunities and you need to punch them in,” said Western coach Jake Desch. “That was the difference is Albemarle took advantage of their opportunities. We created a bunch of positive things, now we’ve got to punch it in. We treat this like a midterm exam, and we’ll learn from this.”
On the flip side, Albemarle did a solid job defensively of locking up Western’s potent offensive group, forcing them into tough shots or coming up with solid plays in that event that the Warriors did get a look. Reese Mattern drew a lot of attention from the Patriots on the wing and Albemarle also recovered nicely to make sure Kayleigh Long or Phebe Ryan didn’t manage to hurt them either.
“Any time that you come in here and play against a well coached team like Western, it bodes well for anybody,” Sherrill said. “(The seniors) have never won here and I think they kind of knew the importance of this game and they collectively put it on their shoulders to get the job done.”
Albemarle continues a challenging week with a Thursday night battle at home against the Charlottesville girls while Western plays host to Fluvanna County Monday.
