PEARCY -- Lake Hamilton held its own against De Queen Tuesday night at Wolf Stadium, but the Lady Leopards scored twice in the final five minutes to secure the win and take the first of the two-game series that concludes on the road next week.
With the score tied for the majority of the match, Lake Hamilton (5-5, 3-5 5A/6A-6) could not hold out for a shootout as the Lady Leopards (9-5, 7-0) found the back of the net with 4:48 remaining to take the lead the final time.
De Queen's Yasmelin Gonzalez took a shot from about 40 yards out to put the visiting team up, 3-2.
Lady Wolf keeper Brianna Tracy-Withers withstood a barrage of shots before De Queen's Sara Victoriano took a shot from the right corner of the goal box. Tracy-Withers went for the save, but the well-placed shot landed in the bottom right corner before the sophomore managed to get a hand on it, setting the final.
"I thought they did a great job on their defense," said De Queen head coach Stephen Sloan. "We kept trying to force some things, I think, and didn't play as well as far as together as a team. I thought we got to trying to do too much individual stuff.
"You've got to give credit to them. They didn't take any unnecessary chances, didn't give us any free shots. We had to try to earn every shot we got."
Tracy-Withers ended the match with 16 saves on the night with six blocks while allowing the four goals.
"We played really well," Lake Hamilton head coach Stacey Scott. "We went to El Dorado last night, and that alone takes it out of you. I was extremely pleased keeping them 2-2 right until the very end. We passed the ball; we pressured the ball. Their No. 27 and No. 9 are good -- strong legs, quick.
"I think on defense, we got a little confused and flat-footed, which allowed them to score there at the end. Overall, I couldn't have asked for a better game, especially coming off El Dorado last night. We keep playing like that, we should finish well and hopefully do well in conference, but we've got to keep up that level of play all the time. Be consistent."
Following De Queen's Daniela Salazar grabbing the ball in the box for a hands foul, Logan Keener stepped to the spot to take a penalty kick for the Lady Wolves. The senior defender blasted the ball into the lower left side of the goal past keeper Natalie Martinez to put the Lady Wolves ahead, 1-0, with 9:12 off the clock in the first half.
Lake Hamilton held onto the lead for around eight minutes before a shot from about 20 yards out from Victoriano got past Tracy-Withers to knot the score with 22:18 remaining in the half.
The score remained unchanged until Victoriano gave the Lady Leopards their first lead of the match with a goal in the second half. With 18:19 remaining, Victoriano powered a shot into the bottom right of the net, just out of reach of Tracy-Withers.
"Sara is a freshman, and she's really a phenomenal player," Sloan said. "You don't get many of them come along very often. I tell the boys all the time that she shoots better than they do, and I really believe that.
"We've just got to get better playing more as a team and making that one extra pass in front of the goal, and I think that will help us in the long run."
The Lady Leopards wasted little time in exacting revenge as sophomore Kayla Mark took a roughly 35-yard shot under pressure to tie the game at 2-2 at the 13:10 mark. The ball slipped just under the crossbar as Martinez hesitated a moment too long.
"I think they were a little surprised, honestly, because we have been up and down," said Scott. "I'm extremely proud of the girls. They fought hard; I couldn't ask for anything better."
Martinez had seven saves and two blocks in the match while allowing a pair of goals.
De Queen's offense managed 42 shots with just 22 of those on goal for 52 percent efficiency. Lake Hamilton was on-target for 10 of its 18 shots for 56 percent efficiency.
Lake Hamilton will play host to Hot Springs (0-11, 0-6) Friday before wrapping up the regular season next week. De Queen is set to return to Garland County to face the Lady Trojans tonight before hosting Texarkana (6-5, 5-3) Friday.
Boys
De Queen started Tuesday's match off with a three-goal blast as it rolled to a 7-0 rout of Lake Hamilton at Wolf Stadium.
Jose Martinez scored two goals and Alejandro Lerma one in the opening 5:10 of the match to give De Queen (11-2, 7-0) a blistering start to the match the Wolves (6-7, 3-5) could not recover from.
Lerma found the goal just 2:10 into the match before Martinez found the back of the net with goals 22 seconds apart for the 3-0 lead.
"We never imagined starting out getting three goals in the first five minutes," said Sloan. "It was kind of the way that we've been playing. We want to try to attack right off the bat.
"With rotating the guys and stuff, we try to get a hard 10 minutes out of them and go to the next group. So far, our first group's scoring a lot for us. The second group is trying to get better. They don't have as much skill there yet, but hopefully as the season progresses, they'll get better."
Martinez picked up a hat trick with 24:33 remaining in the first half after a handball foul by the Wolves in the box. The junior forward put the ball high and left of Wolf keeper Landon Kitt for a 4-0 De Queen lead.
Mateo Garcia made it 5-0 for De Queen with 12:54 left in the half, but Lake Hamilton was able to keep the Leopards scoreless until after the break.
Lerma scored with 39 seconds off the clock in the second half to enact the mercy rule, cutting the time on the clock in half to leave just 19:11 in the game.
Fernando Morales picked up the final goal for De Queen with 9:54 to go after his kick was rebounded by the Wolves defense.
"I was talking to him before (the game)," Lake Hamilton head coach Stan Cooper. "He has 90 players on his roster. He only brings 43 traveling, and the other 47 stay at home... I didn't think it would be quite this bad, but I knew how good they were. I've talked to enough people to know that we were going to have a tough time with them.
"I just hate it for the boys. I thought maybe we would be able to hang in there. They're fast;, they're quick and they shoot well. They're just all-around good -- their first, second and third bunch."
Kitt struggled in goal, picking up just two saves and giving up five goals in the first half, but Christian Edwards, who took over in the second half, allowed two goals with three saves and two blocks. The Lake Hamilton defense accounted for 10 additional saves.
Cooper admitted that with the Wolves having faced El Dorado on Monday, the team might have been hindered slightly in Tuesday's match.
"It may have a little bit, leg-wise," he said. "Not only that, but emotionally, too. It's hard to win at El Dorado, especially the way we had to do it. It was tied 2-2, and we did score two other goals that were basically taken away from us. We ended up having to go to the shootout. Emotionally, our kids were kind of let down a little bit because of the way it happened. Once it did happen, the emotions were there.
"I think having to play them back-to-back like this has an effect. Just like next week, we've got Lakeside Monday and play Hot Springs at Hot Springs. It's going to be tough. This time of year, the weather the way it is, sometimes that's the way it turns out.
The Wolves had 13 shots on the night with just five on goal, 38.5 percent efficiency, while De Queen was over 73 percent efficient with 22 of its 30 goals on target.
"Defense has been playing really well," Sloan said. "The last four or five games, we've had shutouts. We've got one of our starters back; he's been out hurt. We got to build a little depth with other guys. I'm feeling really comfortable with the guys we've got starting with the guys we've got coming off the bench.
"The goalie is a three-year starter. We're a really junior-heavy team right now. We've got a lot of experience, and a lot of kids that's played a lot of games."
Lake Hamilton is set to host Hot Springs (8-5, 5-2) Friday. De Queen travels to Hot Springs tonight before Friday's home match against Texarkana (2-9, 0-8).
Sports on 04/19/2018