North soccer closes out regular season with win, tie

Williamsville North's girls soccer team ended its regular season with two solid games.

The Lady Spartans traveled to Jamestown last Monday and had one of its highest offensive outbursts of the season. North went into halftime with a 2-1 lead and exploded with three goals in the second half for a 5-1 victory.

"Jamestown is always a tough place to play if for no other reason, then the two hours on the bus each way," stated North coach Dan Greiner. "It is nice when you can get out of there with a win. It makes the ride home a lot easier."

Meredith Kirby led North with three goals and an assist. Suzanne Jacobs added a goal and had an assist with three other scores. Gabby Rosen finished the scoring with a great finish with 14 minutes left in the game.

On Friday, North hosted Williamsville East for North's senior day and homecoming game. North finished the day with a 1-1 tie with East, who has been the No. 1 ranked large school in Western New York all season.

"I knew that this would be a good game when Chris (Durr, coach of Williamsville East) and I set it up in June," said Greiner. "I always want our kids to play a good team as a tune-up for sectionals. We played well, and I think it is something that our team can use to get them up for the playoffs."

North started the scoring with a beautiful direct kick from Shannon Algoe from 35 yards away from the goal.

"I have watched Shannon do that for five years," said Greiner. "She has had a tough season with an injury that happened early in the season, but she seems to be back to full strength."

"Her direct kicks are very accurate especially from far away," he added. "I don't think she was going to shoot it originally, but the girls on the bench and I convinced her to have a shot at it. It was a good shot in the upper corner, and the wind at her back made it move a little more than usual."

East tied the game with 29 minutes left in the second quarter with a goal from Jenny Griffin on a through ball from Morgan Begy.

"I was disappointed we didn't play a little better," said Durr. "North had nothing to lose and everything to gain."

"They dominated the first 10 to 15 minutes (of the first half)," he continued. "We kept turning the ball over and giving them more opportunities… I thought we had a better effort in the second half. Our goal seemed to reenergize us and we had a couple of scoring chances. The wind played a big factor on punts and goal kicks."

East goalie Josephine Bochiechio made seven saves. She has 13 shutouts for the year and has given up a school-low five goals in 18 games. East finished 16-0-2. It was the third straight regular season where they went undefeated.

Griffin leads the team with 20 goals and 16 assists followed by Tara Kiernan (10 goals, 10 assists), Jessica Kowalski (nine goals, nine assists) and Katie Griffin (eight goals, six assists). Kayla Acklin, Becky Fedak, Lauren Lapoint and Kelly McNamara each have three goals; Acklin has 10 assists. Jordan Kowalski has tallied five assists.

East, seeded first in the Class A tournament, faced Springville or West Seneca East on Tuesday in the prequarterfinals; the winner plays Amherst or Albion at 3:30 p.m. on Friday in the quarterfinals.

North started its playoff run as a nine seed against ECIC Division I member Frontier, an eight seed, on Tuesday. Results were unavailable before The Bee went to press. North split with Frontier during the regular season with a 4-0 victory and a 1-0 loss. If North prevails, they will face No. 1 seed Orchard Park at 3:30 p.m. on Friday in the quarterfinals.

"I like the way we are playing offensively and defensively right now," said Greiner. "We have had some horrible breaks and near misses this season, so I hope we have gotten that out of our system. If our shots fall, we could be very dangerous in the sectionals."