A win over Pleasant Valley would have provided a huge boost for the Ankeny Centennial girls’ soccer team.
Even a 3-2 loss in double overtime showed the seventh-ranked Jaguars that they can play with one of the state’s top squads.
“I think we can definitely take some positives away from this,” said Centennial junior Ava Martin, who scored both of her team’s goals. “We just showed that we can fight for awhile. They were ranked higher than us. I feel like that just shows we can play with anyone even though it’s early in the season.”
No. 6 Pleasant Valley overcame a 2-0 deficit by scoring three unanswered goals in the Crosstown Invitational on Saturday at Centennial. The Spartans (2-1) bounced back from a similar 3-2 loss in double overtime to No. 1 Valley on Friday.
“They’re good, and they proved to be resilient,” Centennial coach Chris Allen said of the Spartans. “My hat’s off to them. They went to double OT with Valley (on Friday), and they had to come back from that one.”
Pleasant Valley started its comeback when Leah Peakin scored a goal in the 46th minute to cut Centennial’s lead to 2-1. North Dakota State recruit Morgan Russmann later scored the tying goal with less than 7 minutes left in regulation.
“She’s pretty hard to defend,” Centennial junior Maddison Balashaitis said of Russmann, who scored a state-record 41 goals as a junior. “We were just trying to put a lot of pressure on her–make it hard for her and not let her shoot. She’s fast, so try not to let her get 1v1.”
Midway through the second overtime, Russmann got the ball on a counter-attack and found the left side of the net for the golden goal. It was her sixth goal in three games and the 96th of her career.
“They just countered super well,” Allen said. “I think they had three attacking opportunities and scored three goals on us, and so we need to look at that and see what we need to do to fix it.”
Martin had given the Jaguars a 2-0 lead with a pair of goals in a span of 3 minutes. She rebounded her own shot that was deflected back to her and found the left side of the net at the 38:05 mark.
Then, less than a minute into the second half, Martin scored again off another rebound. This time, she finished a shot by Mady Postma that bounced off the crossbar.
“We just need to keep improving every day,” Martin said. “I feel like this was a really good test for us, and I think we’ll just grow from this.”
Despite the loss, Allen was proud of his team’s effort.
“We had to mix up the lineup and had players playing at far less than 100 percent, and they looked so good together for much of the time,” he said. “Our young midfield looked incredibly strong, and Ava was an absolute threat. There were so many good things the girls did together throughout the game.”
Centennial (1-1) opened the season on Friday with a 2-1 victory over Ames. Addison Fair and Emmarie Becker each had a goal for the Jaguars, while McKenna Hilton added an assist.
Emma Evans scored the Little Cyclones’ lone goal on a penalty kick in the 43rd minute. She tied the game at 1-1 before Becker answered with the go-ahead goal on a header 4 minutes later.
“We had 30 shots and 13 of them were on target,” Allen said of his team’s dominant win. “They had one shot, and that was the PK.”
The Crosstown Invitational featured many of the state’s top teams and several close games.
“(Ankeny coach) Simon (Brown) and I are proud to host such quality soccer games, showcasing not only the central Iowa talent, but some of the talent from other parts of the state,” Allen said. “Every team will certainly change by the end of the season, but the passion with which every team competed was so amazing so early in the season.”
The Jaguars will host No. 14 Urbandale (2-0) on Tuesday.
“Our main goal is just to prove everyone wrong,” Balashaitis said. “I think we’re a little bit of an underdog, and I think we all have this motivation and drive inside of us to push through. It might not show from (Saturday), but we’ll come out of this better.”