Miami Trace’s Hailey Webster (10) shields a Jackson player during the second half of the match on Thursday, Sept. 19, 2024. Also picture for the Lady Panthers is Karleigh Cooper. Jackson would win this contest by a score of 3-2.
Tyler Flora | Record-Herald
After suffering a 2-1 loss on Aug. 27, the Miami Trace Lady Panthers (6-3, 2-3 FAC) sought revenge over the Jackson Ironladies (6-2, 3-1 FAC) as they hosted them in a Frontier Athletic Conference soccer match on Thursday evening.
After trailing 1-0 at the half, Miami Trace allowed a quick goal at just the 38:56 mark of the second half to find themselves in a 2-0 deficit.
This seemed to light a fire in the Lady Panthers, as they quickly responded with a strike by Nora Morrison from 25 yards out at the 33:19 mark to make it 2-1.
Around the 18 minute mark, Miami Trace was awarded a free kick. Morrison drilled the ball at the goal keeper who deflected it. The ball was kicked around and Lady Panther Marian Mara was able to punch it through into the back of the net to tie the game at 2-2.
The game remained tied for the next 16 minutes or so, before the Ironladies knocked in a goal off of a deflection at the 1:59 mark to take a very late 3-2 lead, which would be the final.
Miami Trace head coach Chad Tolbert shared some comments after the heartbreaking loss.
“We came out flat in the first half, so we challenged the girls just to fight through. If you saw the first half compared to the second half, you would have thought it was two different teams out there for us, and it wasn’t. The FAC is just a challenge a lot of these games are not multiple goal victories or losses, at least ours haven’t been. One out of bounds call here or one foul call there can make a difference, and that’s just the way it goes.”
He spoke about the youth of his team.
“We have three seniors that are very important to our program. They have been there when we were not very good at all their freshman year. But overall, we are really young as a team. We started two freshmen tonight and a multitude of sophomores and the rest juniors. The future is still bright for us, we just have to battle through these tough losses and keep the intensity. We still have several games left. Hopefully we can just keep grinding and get some of these and make it work for us in our favor.”
Miami Trace (6-4, 2-4 FAC) will host Ross Southeastern (1-8, 1-1 SVC) on Saturday morning at 10 a.m.
Jackson (7-2, 4-1 FAC) will travel to McClain on Tuesday (9-1-1, 4-1-1 FAC).
