North's season ends in semifinals

The Williamsville North girls soccer team's season came to an end last Tuesday with a 2-1 loss to Kenmore West in a Section VI Class AA semifinal game. North was seeded ninth in the tournament; Kenmore West was a fourth seed.

"They beat us in the first 15 minutes of the game, and we just couldn't recover," said North coach Dan Greiner.

Kenmore West's leading scorer, Jenna Rikan, scored on a quality goal eight minutes into the contest. She scored again with five minutes left in the half.

"Jenna is a strong player whom we had seen a couple of weeks earlier in a nonleague match toward the end of the season," said Greiner. "I knew she was good, but I did not think we needed to man-to-man mark her because our defense has done a great job all year with switching marks in the back. It is a decision I wish I could have back."

Greiner said he put Jenny Piaggione on Rikan in the second half and she shut her down.

North scored on a penalty kick by Shannon Algoe with about 15 minutes left in the second half. The team had several quality chances but just couldn't finish, Greiner said.

"I was very proud of the way the girls played during most of the game," said Greiner. "We just didn't play the full 80 minutes and it hurt us. After knocking off the number-one seed (Orchard Park), it is sometimes difficult to turn around and get up for another tough game. I thought we didn't play our best from the start and that hurt us."

North loses four seniors to graduation - Algoe, Meredith Kirby, Kelsey Mulvihill and Megan Owens, but has 13 juniors, three sophomores and two freshmen.

"There are very good players in this program with some excellent players coming up from junior varsity and modified, so even though I won't be coaching next season, whoever takes over is going to be left with a great group of girls to work with," said Greiner.