Trojans trample Jay

In just over two minutes, the Trojans showed why they are undefeated.
Jay County High School’s girls soccer team trailed visiting New Castle just 1-0 after 17 minutes Tuesday. In the next 2:01 the Trojans scored three times, and they continued to roll as they handed the Patriots an 8-0 defeat.
Sophomore Courtney Denney and freshman Olivia Malott did most of the damage for New Castle as they combined for seven goals.
“We knew that coming in,” said JCHS coach Abby Champ of Denney and Malott, who have scored 40 of their team’s 56 goals this season. “Denney even last year was a phenomenal player. We knew Malott … she scores a lot of goals.”
Anna Smith, a sophomore, scored the opening goal five minutes into the game, and then Denney and Malott took care of the rest.
Denney started New Castle’s flurry of goals that put the visiting team in control when she broke away down the right side of the field and scored at the 22:41 mark.
Less than 40 seconds later Denney split a pair of defenders and fired another shot at the goal. Brooke Reynard made a couple of saves for the Patriots, but Malott was there to gather in the rebound and blast the ball home for her first goal of the game.
Malott scored again at the 20:40 mark when she stole the ball from JCHS defender Maddie Bailey inside the 18-yard box and then slid a shot inside the left post for a 4-0 lead.
Denney, who has scored 24 times this year, tallied her second goal at the 5:30 mark for the Trojans’ five-goal halftime lead.
She scored again just 25 seconds after the intermission and notched all three of New Castle’s second-half goals.
“Those girls are a handful for everybody,” said New Castle coach Chris Tillett, whose team is now 8-0. “Those two have done a really nice job of using each other and getting each other free.”
Emily Peavie, Samantha Underwood and Malott each recorded assists for the Trojans, who consistently attacked JCHS (2-4) with give-and-go passes.
“They were short, quick passes all the way down the field,” said Champ. “In the first half we played a lot of offense … and that was because the girls were cutting off the pass. When we got tired, that’s when we started following the pass and then getting beat.”
Jay County, which continued to fight despite its deficit and had several good scoring opportunities in the final 12 minutes, got two shots on goal apiece from Catherine Dunn and Sammi Compton.
“I want to give credit to their team,” said Tillett, whose team has won seven of its eight games by five goals or more. “They didn’t stop hustling. They ran hard for every ball, every play. I loved it. We needed to play against something like that, because we’ve separated ourselves from a lot of teams and a lot of times they’ve kind of quit …
“I was very impressed with their girls.”
Brooke Reynard finished with nine saves for the Patriots.

Junior varsity
Jay County evened the score in the second half, but couldn’t keep up with the Trojans in a 3-1 loss.
Abby Broering scored the lone goal for the Patriots six minutes into the second half to tie the game at 1-1. New Castle responded with goals at the 20:25 and 18:23 marks to take the win.
Carmen Lopez and Broering each finished with two shots on goal for JCHS (2-2). Emily Pogue made 13 saves.


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