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Warriors strike quick against Black Knights

Photo: Ryan Yemen

Sometimes it’s your day and sometimes it’s just not. Both the Western Albemarle and Charlottesville field hockey teams have had their up and downs halfway through the season. On Tuesday, the Warriors might have found a groove as they were dominant in one of those games where they were simply in the right place at the right time all night. Proof and point? The first moments of this game.

 

“The first goal happened so fast I didn’t even realize what was going on,” said Western coach Milo Oakland. “I’m told it was a beautiful goal, I didn’t even realize it got tipped in.”

 

Western got on the board early, real early. And while the Black Knights answered with a slew of short corners early in the first half, that was their best chance at answering as the Warriors owned the time of possession battle and cruised to a 4-0 win.

 

“If you get off to a start like that you get to dictate the game, the style and the other team has to adjust at time they probably didn’t expect to,” Oakland said. “Charlottesville responded well and it might have fired them up more than it did us, so we burned an early timeout. But we settled down, connected passes and I think went on and played our most complete game of the season.”

 

With seniors Valerie Hajek and Madison Masloff asserting themselves early, it was a Masloff strike that was nicked by Joie Funk just 75 seconds in to give Western a 1-0 lead.

 

Charlottesville answered with a streak of four short corners in response over the next three minutes but could not penetrate the Warriors defense. While it was a strong push, after a time out, Western was at midfield or on the CHS side of the field for nearly all of the rest of the way.

 

“We have the capability to compete but little things mess with us, whether it was fatigue or that they got up on us the second time,” said Charlottesville coach Lindsay Clark. “Then it was like we couldn’t fight back. Battling that mental game is the hardest part right now.”

 

With just over five minutes to play, the Warriors got another deflection goal, this time with Kira Repich tipping in a shot off a Hajek assist.

 

“I’m usually ready for when Val hits it, to be ready to tip it,” Repich said. “Since it was a bit of a higher shot I lifted my stick and was just able to get enough of it and it went around the goalie. It was a good intense step-up of energy. I think maybe it helps with the team dynamic too.”

 

Hajek then scored on a canon of a shot off a short corner in the first 80 seconds of the second half to make it 3-0. Western wasn’t done as Repich made quick work of a centering pass from Funk to wrap up the scoring with 14:37 left in the game.

 

“That was the same kind of goal with Joie where she lifted it up and I tried to work it around the goalie,” Repich said. “We’ve been working a lot on passing around the circle, easy passes for us to receive. Overall, the passing helped us out a lot tonight.”

 

On the night, Repich had two goals. Hajek and Funk both had a goal and an assist. Western had nine shots on the night and seven short corners. Megan Yourkavitch posted the shutout in the cage stopping the lone shot Charlottesville put on goal.

 

For Charlottesville, goalkeeper Rebecca Sutphin had a pair of saves. Elizabeth Kromkowski had the Black Knights’ lone shot on goal.

 

“Tonight we just mentally did not show up and struggled with our confidence,” Clark said. “We have two inexperienced center-mids trying to go up against two of the most experienced in Masloff and Hajek so we just struggled tonight.”

 

Western (5-3-1) hosts Louisa County on Thursday while Charlottesville (4-5) heads to Orange County, also on Thursday at 7 p.m.

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