By DAVID ERSOFF, Journal Sports
The Bossier Bearkats held onto their Division III District 1 title Monday night, while Captain Shreve held off Byrd for the Division I District 1 crown and Haughton rolled to the Division II District 1 championship in boys action as the high school soccer regular season ended.
While championships weren’t at stake in girls action, Caddo Magnet’s Audrey Jordan continued her assault on parish scoring records with a four-goal performance.
The LHSAA will set the postseason playoff brackets today with competition beginning later this week.
In its’ 2-0 win over Sterlington, Bossier dominated play throughout the game, with the Panthers only mustering three opportunities to score, all of which were in the first 15 minutes. With 8 minutes left in the first half, Wilson Alverado took a short free kick to David Rojas who banged home the half’s only goal. The second half saw Alverado and Rojas team up again on a give and go, doubling Bossier’s lead, and rounding out the final score.
Captain Shreve and Byrd played an exciting championship game. The Gators jumped out to a 3-0 halftime lead, and that’s when the craziness began. The Yellow Jackets scored two early second half goals to close the gap. The Gators pushed back with a fourth goal. Byrd closed within one again as time was ticking away. At 4-3, a Shreve defender was called for a hand ball in the box, sparking some tempers to overflow and resulting in a Gator getting a red card and an ejection while a yellow was flashed to an assistant coach for Shreve. The Yellow Jackets scored the PK.
Shreve took the ensuing kickoff down the field to score and capture the district title. Shreve had two goals from Andrew Bradford, and one each by Landon Kay and Reese Wren. There was also a Byrd own goal. Bradford had three assists with one by Soloman Thawngceu. For Byrd, Garrett Gullet scored two goals, while Brennan Nguyen and Matt Booras notched a goal each. Assists were credited to Wilson Guidry and Jackson Cooper.
Haughton rolled to a 5-1 victory over Caddo Magnet, taking the lead midway through the opening half. Magnet tied it near the end of the first half on a PK, but the Bucs reigned in the second period. Haughton’s Abdul Zidan scored three times, bring his career goal total to 53, and Carter Ebarb had the other two, upping his career count to 76. Assists were created by Ethan Osban, Chris Ontiveros and Ebarb. Magnet’s Alex Baltov scored on the penalty kick.
As Magnet’s girls’ soccer team took the field against Ouachita Parish, Jordan already owned the Caddo Parish record career goal mark at 146. The Lady Mustangs wanted to get Jordan to 150 and did so, as she scored four in a 5-0 victory. She has a school-record 59 goals for the season. The state records for both are amazing numbers by Parkway’s Rachel Alexander, with 242 career goals (fifth nationally) and 82 in a season (eighth nationally) before she graduated in 2004.
Benton finished with a hard-fought win over North DeSoto Monday night. The Lady Tigers had the 1-0 halftime lead, when Chloe Phillips scored the equalizer with 15 minutes remaining. A few minutes later Benton went back on top with a PK goal then added a late goal to make the final 3-1. Phillips’ score was assisted by Melanie Windham. Benton got goals from Abigail Jacobs, Karson Best and Eden Whiteman, with assists by Lanie Machen and Emma Friar.
There were a few head-scratching results on the boys side last week. Biggest among those was Loyola’s upset of top-ranked Bossier 1-0, on Thursday night at Messmer Stadium. In front of a large crowd, Bossier dominated play for the first 76 minutes of the game, having an 80/20 possession ratio and a 18-2 shots-on-goal advantage. What Bossier didn’t have was goalkeeper Hudson Moore.
The Flyers’ keeper made all 18 saves, including enough spectacular stops to create a college recruiting highlight reel. It was the single best display of goalkeeping I have seen all year, and being a father of a keeper, I pay attention. With four minutes remaining Loyola had a 45-yard free kick that Jackson Silmon sent into the box. The Bearkats keeper, Logan Bamberg, came out to punch it away, but it deflected to the feet of Casey Wall, who scored the game winner. This was even more surprising after Loyola struggled to put Evangel away, ultimately winning 2-1.
Northwood had a rough week, falling 2-1 to both Parkway and Airline. The Falcons had been on a roll until these games and their playoff seeding will suffer. Parkway was not done with surprises, as the Panthers shocked Magnet with a 1-1 draw on Thursday.
Heading into Monday’s showdown, Captain Shreve handled its business with victories over Benton 3-0, and Haughton 5-0. Byrd also held serve, beating Magnet 3-0 and Airline 5-1.
Girls’ teams had their share of surprising results. The biggest was the Benton Lady Tigers tying Byrd 2-2 on Saturday, and Byrd scored in the last 30 seconds to salvage the tie. Benton earned a second-place tie in D-I District I with Byrd.
North DeSoto had a rollercoaster week, winning, closer then expected games with Minden 4-0 and Northwood 3-0, sandwiched by putting a good fight against the consensus top local team in Captain Shreve, falling by only 4-0. The Lady Griffins ended their busy week bowing 9-1 to Magnet, which also posted an 8-0 victory over Huntington, between hard-fought losses to Byrd 4-1 and Loyola 5-0.
Calvary and Evangel played to a 1-1 tie Friday night, which also put the rivals locked for second in D-IV district play. Parkway solidified its D-II top 10 state power ranking by dispatching Huntington 8-0, Natchitoches Central 3-1 and Northwood 5-0. Those wins and their earlier tie with North DeSoto drew the Lady Panthers and Lady Griffins even for second in D-II District 1.
Contact David at dersoff@bellsouth.net