Trigg County’s intent was to make quick work of Union County in the first round of the girls’ second region soccer tournament on Monday, and the Lady Wildcats did just that, picking up a 10-0 mercy rule win over the Bravettes at Madisonville’s Donley Field.
Trigg’s two leading scorers during the season, Leiah Hite and Hallie Joiner, did most of the damage offensively. Hite scored five goals, including the final three in a three-minute span late in the match, while Joiner scored four times.
“Our focus coming into the match was just continuing to play our style of soccer, move the ball, communicate well, be patient on the attack, and then get quality looks for a finish,” Trigg County coach Jason Hite said.
Hite assisted her little sister, Landie, for Trigg’s second goal and had a helper on one of Joiner’s goals.
Lydia Redd added an assist to Joiner for Trigg’s seventh goal.
Trigg led 2-0 13 minutes into the match before scoring eight times over the next 14 minutes.
Hite’s five goals give her 39 for the season while Joiner improved her stat sheet to 24 goals.
The Trigg coach was able to mix and match players for most of the half against a Union County squad that played one man down and dressed only 11 players.
“We’ve got a lot of freshmen that are starting to play minutes and be huge for us next year as we lose a couple of seniors, so some of those kids are going to have to fill in and play big minutes next year,” Hite said.
The Lady Wildcats fired 33 shots in the match with Union County’s goalie, Kylie Cross making 18 saves – two more than her season average per match.
Trigg’s defense, which limited Lyon County to only two shots in last week’s district championship win, held Union County without a shot on Monday.
The Bravettes (2-17-1) were looking for their first region tournament win in nine years.
Trigg County (15-5-1) won its region tournament opener for the third straight year, a program first. They move to 7-15 all-time in region tournament openers.
Monday was the 20th all-time meeting between Trigg County and Union County with Trigg improving to 18-2. They have won 17 straight in the series.
The Lady Wildcats will play Madisonville in Wednesday’s semifinal match at 5:30.
Madisonville defeated Hopkinsville 7 -1 in Monday’s other semifinal match. Trigg County lost to Madisonville earlier this season 6-0. The Lady Maroons are 10-0 all-time against Trigg.
“We just need to be patient on the attack, make sure we play our game, and not give up some easy balls on the wings to play in so those are the hardest ones for us to defend,” Hite said about Wednesday’s match with Madisonville.
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