Northeast-10
Championship
#4 Bryant 1 at #2 Franklin Pierce 3
RINDGE, N.H.
- Going for its first Northeast-10 Championship,
the Bryant Women's Soccer team came up just short, as they lost to
second-ranked Franklin Pierce 3-1 Sunday afternoon at a blustery
Sodexho Field.
The win gives the Ravens, ranked tenth nationally, their seventh
straight NE-10 title.
Gabriela Demoner scored the game-winning goal in the
65th minute, scoring her 12th of the season.
Demoner scored three goals against Bryant earlier this season in a
3-1 victory for the Ravens. Ann Foley assisted on the go-ahead
goal. Demoner capped a stellar season, in which she joined the team
in its fourth game. The Ravens have not lost since Demoner arrived
from Brazil.
Shona Franklin put the match away in the 89th minute,
as she got behind the pinching Bulldog defense, and put away the
breakaway goal.
Senior captain Casey Grange (Methuen, Mass.)
took a Tricia Spada (Dedham, Mass.) centering
pass, and fired it past Ravens goaltender Jenna Mello for the
game-tying goal moments before the end of the first half. It was
Grange's 19th tally of the season.
Franklin Pierce got on the board first as Laura Stockdale beat
Katie Mitchell (Deer Park, N.Y.) on a breakaway to
Mitchell's right. Jenna Giardina set Stockdale up on the breakaway
goal in the 22nd minute.
The Bulldogs had plenty of first-half chances as Daisy
Martinez (Eliot, ME) was denied by a diving save from
Mello. In the 29th minute, a Danielle Malta
(Bethel, Conn.) blast from 30 yards out was stopped by a
sprawling Mello. Amy Orzechowski (Milford, Conn.)
was robbed by Mello in the 44th minute, as the Ravens
netminder dove to her right, barely knocking the ball away from the
goal.
Bryant outshot the Ravens 7-2 in the first half.
The Ravens missed a 2-on-1 opportunity in the 53rd
minute as Giardina shot the ball just over the net. She had
Mitchell down and the net wide open.
Minutes later, Orzechowski fired one to Mello's left that
changed direction when the ball ricocheted off a Raven defender,
but Mello recovered to make the save.
Malta had a free kick from 30-yards out in the 77th
minute that got behind the defense, but Spada could not catch up to
it, and it sailed past everyone for a goal kick.
That was the best chance the Bulldogs would get the rest of the
way, as they were stifled by a suffocating Ravens' defense.
The Bulldogs were without injured goaltender Jessica
Neales (Swansea, Mass.) and second-leading scorer
Diane Pascale (Plymouth, Mass.). Mitchell and
Martinez replaced the injured players in the starting lineup.
Bryant saw its seven game winning streak snapped with the loss,
while the Ravens (17-2-0, 12-2-0 NE-10) increased its streak to 16
since starting the season 1-2.
After the game, the Northeast-10 announced that Grange was named
to the All-Conference first-team, while Malta and Spada were second
team members. Pascale was a third team selection.
The Bulldogs (15-7-1, 9-4-1 NE-10) will await the official
seedings in the upcoming NCAA Tournament which will be announced
Monday at 5 p.m. on ncaasports.com.
Game-time temperature was 38 degrees, and it was very windy with
occasional snow flurries.
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