GLEN CARBON – If anyone had asked Father McGivney girls soccer head coach Matthew McVicar if his team would open the season at 9-0, he would have told them no.
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“No, honestly, I don’t think we would have,” he said Tuesday night after a 4-1 win over conference rivals Marquette Catholic. “Of course, we’ll take it. We still have work to do.”
“You look at the schedule and circle the ones that you know are going to be tough, and you know you want to win, and Marquette is one of them. So, to get them twice in the season is pretty impressive. They didn’t make it easy, it’s always scrappy with them, but we’re happy for our start.”
A 9-0 start is impressive on its own, but for the first eight games, the Griffins shut out their opponents each time. They had outscored their opposition 35-0 until Tuesday.
But the streak did end when Marquette’s Radley Hoener found the back of the net just before halftime to make it a 3-1 game at Godfrey’s Glazebrook Community Park.
“The work that they put in, the effort. After so many, it becomes pride,” McVicar said about the shutout streak. “It was never a goal to go that long going without conceding, but after two or three games, it was like, ‘Hey, how long can we get this to go?’ But soccer is soccer, you’re going to get scored on.”
McGivney had gone eight games, 676 minutes and 16 seconds to be exact, without allowing a goal.
“I told them, the great thing about streaks ending is that now we can start a new one,” McVicar said. “Stop people from scoring, that’s how you win games. Our defense has just been nails for us.”
Tuesday’s win improved McGivney to 5-0 in the Gateway Conference. They beat the defending IHSA Class 1A state champs, Althoff Catholic, by a score of 1-0 back on April 1.
That’s when the winning streak really began to set in.
“Yeah, I think so, defending state champs,” McVicar said. “Losing to them last year in the playoffs, the way we did to PKs. It lets the girls know that we’re capable of doing it.”
Althoff hosted the sectional last season and beat McGivney in the semifinals after 100 minutes and a penalty shootout by a score of 3-1. April 1 was just the second time McGivney had beaten Althoff.
The two teams will meet again in Glen Carbon on Friday, May 2, at 7 p.m.
Offensively, McGivney is led in scoring by Natalie Beck with 12 goals and two assists. Three players – Emerson Isringhausen, Erin Kretzer, and Sofia Rossetto – have each scored four goals. Isringhausen also has seven assists. Rachel Kretzer has five assists.
The offense is coming from just about anyone, as 12 different players have scored through the opening nine games.
In the net, and helping maintain that shutout streak, were Peyton Ellis and Karpenter Farmer. The two split time in goal just about equally. Ellis has played 360 minutes to Farmer’s 320. The two haven’t been tested often thanks to McGivney’s stellar defensive efforts.
The Griffins will look to make it 10 in a row on Friday, April 11, when they host Metro-East Lutheran under the lights beginning at 7 p.m. They will then travel to Civic Memorial on Saturday for a 10 a.m. start.
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