Lady Panthers roll after slow start
■ Megan Hutto recorded her second straight hat trick in a 7-1 win over El Dorado.
El Dorado girls soccer coach Neville Matthews liked what he saw for the first 30 minutes of the Lady Wildcats’ 6A-West Conference Tournament semifinal girls soccer match against Siloam Springs.
Then the three-time defending 6A champion Lady Panthers turned up the heat.
Siloam Springs exploded for four goals in the last 17 minutes of the first half to take a 4-0 lead at halftime. The Lady Panthers then added three quick goals in the second half for a 7-1 mercyrule victory at Panther Stadium.
“The first 30 minutes of the game, we handled them and then we just went flat,” Matthews said. “They just started to move the ball a little better than us and had my girls ball chasing a little bit. They’re just solid.”
Siloam Springs junior Megan Hutto scored her second straight hat trick, scoring three goals for the No. 1 seed Lady Panthers (20-3) along with tying a singleseason school record with her 18th assist.
Freshman Shelby Johnson added two goals for Siloam Springs, while junior Audrey Maxwell added to her singleseason record with her 36th goal as well as recording her 16th assist of the year.
Brooklyn Buckminster added a goal and assist for Siloam Springs, while Laura Morales had two assists for the Lady Panthers.
Siloam Springs won its fifth straight game and beat El Dorado for the second time in less than a year. The Lady Panthers previously beat the Lady Wildcats 6-0 in the Class 6A state semifinals a year ago in El Dorado.
“Coming into this game, I told my girls, it’s David and Goliath,” Matthews said. “Everybody has a good day. Play them tough, and I felt like they did play them tough for the first 30 minutes. But Siloam, they’re a good team. I just like watching them play.”
Siloam Springs had some early scoring chances but couldn’t finish as El Dorado kept the game scoreless.
Buckminster finally broke through with the game’s first goal with 16:50 left in the first half from about 30 yards out to give the Lady Panthers a 1-0 lead. It was Buckminster’s 10th goal, which ranks third on the team, and the assist went to Morales.
“Yeah the first 10 to 15 minutes took us a little time to get going,” said Siloam Springs head coach Brent Crenshaw. “I don’t know if it was nerves or what it was. We were playing hard, but we just weren’t playing very smart. Decision making (wasn’t good), we weren’t striking the ball very
well, little things like that. But once we figured it out, they did a really good job.”
Hutto made it 2-0 with 9:45 left in the first half with Morales recording her second assist and ninth overall on the season.
Johnson made it 3-0 with a goal with 6:02 left, assisted by Hutto, and the freshman scored again with 30 seconds left on a Maxwell assist in the first half to give Siloam Springs a 4-0 lead at halftime. It was Johnson’s fourth goal and Hutto’s 18th assist which tied her with Sarah Kidd for the single-season school record.
Crenshaw said it was good to see Johnson play strong on Thursday.
“‘Baby deer’ is what we call her,” Crenshaw said of Johnson. “She’s just an athlete trying to figure things out. She gets a little better every time she steps on the field. We need to get her to quit thinking so much and just go be an athlete like she did scoring those two goals. She’s so fast and she can throw a ball 40 yards in the air on a throw in. That gives us another threat.”
Buckminster picked up her ninth assist on Hutto’s second goal with 38:36 left in the second half as Siloam Springs pulled ahead 5-0. Maxwell made it a 6-0 lead with 36:38 left and cut the remaining time in half via the Arkansas Activities Association sportsmanship rule.
Hutto scored again shortly afterward for Siloam Springs’ final goal and the Lady Panthers emptied their bench.
Hutto’s three goals on Thursday gave her eight in her last three games and 21 for the year.
“Sometimes (Hutto) kind of gets overshadowed by Audrey’s goal-scoring ability, but when you look at Hutto she scores goals and she has tons of
assists,” Crenshaw said. “She looks really confident out there. She’s really strong on the ball. That’s something that she’s really worked at this year. Her strength is really good this year.”
El Dorado got on the scoreboard with 7:01 left when Carson Henry scored for the Lady Wildcats (14-4), the No. 4 seed who will play Saturday in the third place game against Benton.
“I was telling my girls, these (Siloam Springs) girls are soccer players,” Matthews said. “We’ve got girls that like soccer. … We’re getting there.”
With the victory, Siloam Springs advanced to Saturday’s 6A-West Conference Championship game against Russellville, which defeated Benton 5-4 in penalty kicks after a scoreless regulation. Results of Saturday’s championship were not available at presstime.
The win also guaranteed Siloam Springs a firstround bye in the Class 6A state tournament, which will be held Thursday through Saturday at Panther Stadium and Sager Creek Soccer Park. El Dorado, meanwhile, played at Benton in the third-place game. Results were not available at presstime.