{"id":2442013,"date":"2019-03-21T22:56:00","date_gmt":"2019-03-22T04:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.aspentimes.com\/news\/steamboat-springs-girls-soccer-knocks-off-aspen-winning-5-4-despite-a-hat-trick-from-francis\/"},"modified":"2019-03-22T08:37:17","modified_gmt":"2019-03-22T14:37:17","slug":"steamboat-springs-girls-soccer-knocks-off-aspen-winning-5-4-despite-a-hat-trick-from-francis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/local-news\/steamboat-springs-girls-soccer-knocks-off-aspen-winning-5-4-despite-a-hat-trick-from-francis\/","title":{"rendered":"Steamboat Springs girls soccer knocks off Aspen, winning 5-4 despite a hat trick from Francis"},"content":{"rendered":"
Aspen sophomore Kelley Francis looks to pass in the game against Steamboat Springs on Thursday, March 21 at Gardner Field. (Photo by Leah Vann)<\/strong>
Leah Vann<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

STEAMBOAT SPRINGS \u2014 In the first game on its home turf, the Steamboat Springs High School girls soccer team saw its scoring drought come to an end.<\/p>\n

The Class 4A Sailors (1-2) hosted 3A Aspen (2-2) on Thursday in what turned into a back-and-forth offensive shootout. Steamboat would have the final say, 5-4, to notch its first victory of the season after going scoreless in its first two losses.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt sets us up for a lot of momentum,\u201d Steamboat coach Rob Bohlmann said. \u201cIf you go 0-3 you\u2019re really scratching your head.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Skiers were the first to strike when junior Payton Curley drew Steamboat goalie Caroline Lupori to the outer right edge of the goal, knocking a ground shot into the left corner.<\/p>\n

Aspen\u2019s top scorer, sophomore Kelley Francis, knocked in the next goal less than 30 seconds later to spot a 2-0 lead for the Skiers. It was the beginning of a long night of seeing Francis\u2019 shots hit the net. She led the Skiers with three goals on the night.<\/p>\n

The Sailors found strength in their speed on offense, launching their first two goals within less than three minutes of each other.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust the ability to answer back and it starts with the tremendous character and that says a lot, especially after our first two games,\u201d Bohlmann said. \u201cWe go down 2-nil, you could\u2019ve gotten inside your head, could\u2019ve gotten frustrated, could\u2019ve gotten down, and they kept playing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Steamboat\u2019s first goal of the season came on a breakaway by junior Sophie Leeson, tricking the goalie with her footwork as she sped around and chipped in an easy goal for a 2-1 score. Leeson was the star of the night for the Sailors, also scoring three goals.<\/p>\n

\u201cHer mobility off the ball was really good,\u201d Bohlmann said. \u201cThat\u2019s the biggest thing we\u2019ve been talking about up front is the mobility off the ball, working off of each other, running laterally, looking to be those target players and it was much improvement. She covered a lot of ground tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n

SSHS senior Rachelle Koly sprinted down the outer left edge of the field, battling a defender that followed her footsteps. She launched a shot from nearly 20 yards out, crashing the top left corner of the net to tie the game at 2-2.<\/p>\n

\u201cGoals are scored by other teams making mistakes and boy did we make a few today,\u201d Aspen coach John Gillies said. \u201cThey passed the ball around well, but it\u2019s something we had under control and all of a sudden they score that silly goal and we panicked \u2026 it was like a deer in the headlights.\u201d<\/p>\n

Steamboat claimed the lead when sophomore Lilli Armstrong attempted a shot and Leeson drove in its ricochet to take the 3-2 advantage. Aspen\u2019s Francis followed with a goal shortly after to tie it at 3-3.<\/p>\n

Just before the half ended, Steamboat senior Delaney Moon knocked in a fourth goal on a header off a corner kick by senior Megan Salyer to reclaim the lead, 4-3.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe got caught out with some of your (Steamboat) girls\u2019 speeds,\u201d Gillies said. \u201cWe tried to compensate by putting girls with more speed and less skills so we lost something and gained something.\u201d<\/p>\n

The pace had been set, but the Skiers weren\u2019t letting up. Francis kicked off the second half with her third goal to tie the game up at 4-4.<\/p>\n

Stronger defense limited token opportunities for shots on goal in the second half. The Skiers and Sailors remained scoreless until halfway through when Leeson scored her final goal of the night on a header to give the Sailors a 5-4 lead.<\/p>\n

As the clock ticked down the final seconds, the Skiers scrambled to put together a final corner kick. Francis sprinted to the edge, lobbing a kick to the middle of both teams and Steamboat had the first touch, knocking it out of contention as the clock struck zero.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a good game. It\u2019s a shame it ends this way,\u201d Gillies said. \u201cWe wanted to play Steamboat. I know they\u2019ve got a great program, I know they\u2019re good. \u2026 We should walk off the field feeling privileged.\u201d<\/p>\n

Aspen, ranked No. 4 in Class 3A, now is off for spring break.<\/p>\n

lvann@steamboatpilot.com<\/a><\/p>\n

via:: The Aspen Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Aspen sophomore Kelley Francis looks to pass in the game against Steamboat Springs on Thursday, March 21 at Gardner Field. (Photo by Leah Vann)Leah Vann STEAMBOAT SPRINGS \u2014 In the first game on its home turf, the Steamboat Springs High School girls soccer team saw its scoring drought come to an end. The Class 4A […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2442013","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-15 16:27:17","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2442013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2442013"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2442013\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2442013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2442013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2442013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}