‘’Lauren Bye played the game of her life in the middle,’’ first-year coach Todd Wells said. ‘’She came out of the game for only three minutes. ‘’We’ve had a tough road and it seems like we haven’t played at home in forever. The girls are resilient and I’m so proud, so happy for them.’’ As for the winning goal, Wells has seen it go against Northern. ‘’We’ve lost two 1-0 games on that very play,’’ he said. ‘’ For us, this game is redemption.’’
Tonight watch your Lady Huskies take on the Mustangs across town at Portage Central. Game time is 5:00 for JV and 6:45 for Varsity.
“Northern had the ball in our end, but our defense was up to the task,” Sanxter said. “They’ve been together for some time, and they put pressure on the ball.”Sanxter credited defenders Bush, Natalie Avery, Dani McCarty and Olivia Clipfell. Wells was also impressed by Caledonia’s defending. “Their defending was fantastic,” he said. “They’re well coached. We were pretty limited in terms of our offense. “But I don’t think they had great chances either. We defended well also.” Portage Northern plays Portage Central on Monday. “It’s obviously a huge rivalry game,” Wells said. “We’re just looking forward to playing with some emotion and some urgency. I’m hoping that both teams play their best and that it’s a great game.”
“We’ve played with a lot of energy and enthusiasm, and that’s been the difference for us in the last couple of games,” Portage Northern coach Todd Wells said. “We love to spread out the scoring, and we had a lot of players play well today. Grace started off the game really well, and for a lot of our younger players, she’s a good role model. She started the game with a lot of energy, pushed the pace, and she really helped us do that early. It’s nice to see our senior leaders doing that. They’re the engine of the team, and the rest follow that lead.” The women travel to face St Joseph on Wednesday.
Portage Northern goal one by Tia Lamie and goal two a header from Lauren Ross. Numerous saves by Lizzy Kimmel. Unfortunately I am not as good of a sports writer so do we have a volunteer? You can read the MLIVE article here but it seems pretty one sided.
Portage Northern sophomore Tia Lamie scored three second-half goals in a 3-0 victory over host Niles on Wednesday, earning the Huskies their first win of the season in the process.
Rae Herbert, Lauren Ross and Catherine Willoughby each assisted on one of Lamie’s goals, and freshman Liz Kimmel finished with four saves to preserve the shutout for the Huskies.
“Tia scored a lot of goals for us as a freshman, but it’s taken her a couple of games this season to find her groove,” Portage Northern coach Todd Wells said. “We haven’t had a game like tonight where we’ve had a lot of chances this season, so even though we didn’t convert as many as I’d have liked, it was nice to play some offense for once after playing a lot of defense recently.”
Wells said that the shutout victory was a big boost to Kimmel’s confidence.
“She’s been under a lot of pressure all season, and I’ve been telling her at practice that she hasn’t really made any mistakes this season,” Wells said. “She’s made every save you would expect, and even a few you wouldn’t expect from a freshman goalkeeper.
“She deserved this win, and the best thing is that she’s only going to continue to get better.”
Portage Northern (1-4, 1-1 SMAC West) plays Battle Creek Lakeview on Friday for its next game.
Senior Miranda Monroe scored in the 14th minute for the only goal in Plainwell’s 1-0 road win over Portage Northern on Monday.
Monroe took a throw-in from Kerry Swain and beat three players before putting a shot in the corner of the net for the game-winning goal.
“Miranda is so powerful, and she can be very direct,” Plainwell coach David Groves said. “She has the ability to do that. I know she would like to be on the scoresheet more, but shes’ been great with her overall play and getting others involved, so I’m happy she was able to get the goal.”
Plainwell keeper Lauren Stefl turned away four shots for her fourth shutout of the season. Along with a solid defensive effort, Groves said Stefl played a major role in the win.
“Lauren had a phenomenal save that’s the best I’ve ever seen her make,” Groves said. “It was off a set piece, and one of our players accidentally tipped it on, and she made a diving save to tip it around the post in the 50th minute.”
Now sitting at 4-1 on the season, Plainwell will be back in action hosting Otsego on Wednesday, while Portage Northern will look for its first win of the year at Niles the same night
Anna Klingenmeyer’s first-half goal secured the Grand Rapids Forest Hills Central girls soccer team’s 1-0 victory over Portage Northern on Friday.
“She picked up the ball at the top of the box and hit a great shot to the far post and that was it,” Forest Hills Central coach Jeremy Stacy said. “We had a great number of other chances and just couldn’t convert tonight.”
Bailey Korhorn added an assist, and the Rangers’ goalkeeper had no saves.
“Our defense played really hard with lots of pressure on them,” Stacy said. “We were also able to maintain the ball for the majority of the game and that kept them from ever really attacking.”
Portage Northern freshman goalkeeper Liz Kimmel had nine saves.
“Liz is fantastic,” Portage Northern coach Todd Wells said. “I really can’t say enough about her. We’ve been working on our defensive organization this week, and we were better defensively.
“We’re taking baby steps at this point and working on some things. We were more organized tonight.”
Forest Hills Central hosts Lowell and Portage Northern hosts Plainwell, both games on Monday.
Avery Bauer scored twice to lead Stevensville Lakeshore as the Lancers downed visiting Portage Northern 4-0 on Wednesday.
Dani DeFries chipped in a goal and two assists for Stevensville Lakeshore, and Lindsay Ebeling added a goal as well for the Lancers, who led 3-0 at the half.
Lauren Clem made seven saves to earn the shutout victory for the Lancers.