Eden Shuts Out Holland in Nail-biting Fashion

By Jake Fyock

In a girls’ soccer contest that saw rough weather throughout the game and tip off being rescheduled from 7 pm to 5 pm, the Eden Raiders came away with a 1-0 victory over the Holland Lady Dutchmen tonight.

Coming into the contest both teams played on Wednesday night; Eden faced Alden and the game ended in a 1-1 draw while Holland lost to Springville 5-0.

Raiders head coach Kevin Wittman mentioned that playing the previous day was going to be a challenge for his team, their game against Alden went into double overtime.

“Us playing 100 minutes last night, double overtime, getting a tie, aside from the fact that there’s all these games in a short amount of time, that was a huge challenge for us,” Wittman said.

From the beginning, Eden had a couple of goal opportunities within 10 minutes of capitalizing. Their goal scorer and senior forward Jessica Souder provided shots during the 35 and 30-minute marker, but both went wide right to the net.

Souder’s third chance would come with 21 minutes remaining in the first half. Teammate and senior forward Allison Banko was on the attack and got tripped up by a Lady Dutchmen inside the box.

This resulted in a penalty kick for the Raiders; Souder rose to the occasion, drilled it past the goalkeeper on the bottom left side for her 7th goal of the season and put her team up 1-0.

“Jessica Souder is starting to play the way I always wanted my strikers to play with her back to the net, playing the ball back so she can get one in return. She’s got a great shot,” said Wittman.

From there to the end of the first half, Eden took over by controlling possession of the ball and not letting their opponents initiate an attacking offense. The backline, which consisted of senior defenders Camille Profic, Jaden Korhummel, Tori Woodworth and Sophomore defender Brynn Hall, did well containing Holland’s offense from getting easy shots and working them to the outside.

The second half showed that Holland’s head coach Kelly Reisdorf adjusted her offense. Freshman Kierra Kline created space for herself a couple of times, setting herself up for nice shots. Eden freshman goalkeeper Haley Pompeo came up big and stopped Kline and multiple shots she faced.

Late in the game Wittman made an adjustment by moving Souder back and Woodworth up front to stop last-second chances for Holland.

“I didn’t want any mistakes back there. They can pressure all they want we can keep them to the outside as long as they got somebody that can remain calm in the middle and Tori and Jessica do a pretty good job of doing that,” Wittman said.

The clock ticked down to zero as Holland was looking for another opportunity, but it was too late. The buzzer sounded and Eden came away with the win, giving Wittman his first ever win against the Lady Dutchmen.

Eden moves to 3-2-1 on the year and 2-2-1 in ECIC Division four; they will play North Collins Saturday morning at 11:00 am.

Holland drops to 2-3 on the year and 2-3 in league play; it will be five days until their net game, they face the Tonawanda Warriors on Tuesday, October 20th.