Chandler McAlexander looks for an opening to kick the ball toward Elko's net.
In its penultimate series for the season, the Lady Wave played three tough home matches in four days against Elko, Spring Creek and South Tahoe.
The Lady Wave play Incline at home today at 2 p.m. for the last match of the regular season. This also will be senior night for the team’s seven seniors; they will be honored after their match and before the boys’ team plays.
Monday’s match against South Tahoe ended under the mercy rule, 8-0, with 9 minutes left on the clock. Fallon had a slow first half, allowing three goals during the first 20 minutes. Things started to pick up, though, and they prevented Tahoe from getting shots; the Lady Vikings, however, had great control of the ball and another goal went in at 14 minutes and a final at 3:33.
In the second half the Lady Wave picked up its stride. One goal made it through Fallon’s defense at the start of the half, but the Wave defense hit the field hard from there and kept Tahoe’s attackers from getting a clear shot. The home team players started tiring out as the match continued, though, and another goal went in at 12:30, followed by a final one a few minutes later.
Fallon coach Randy Hines noted South Tahoe is one of the top three teams in the division, and potentially qualifies in the top two. He said they made Fallon’s team look worse than it actually is.
“Good teams tend to do that,” he said. “They can pass around and make you look like you don’t know what you’re doing.”
There were good things though. Hines said the Wave did well, playing the ball wide and bringing lots of intensity in the second half. He noted there were instances where they left an opening that led to a 25-yard shot on the goal or ignored windows where they could have taken a shot of their own.
“I can’t say if it’s fatigue or effort, lack of discipline, whatever,” Hines said. “We gave them too much time and they took advantage of it.”
In the end, Hines said they had trouble getting good momentum, both on defense and offense.
The Lady Wave also played back-to-back home matches over the weekend, losing to Elko (4-1) and Spring Creek (4-0). Hines said neither match’s final score represented how the team played, however. In both matches the Wave gave over a series of penalty kicks that gave the other team an advantage; the coach said Friday’s match against Spring Creek could have been 1-0 if not for the errors.
“It could have been a lot closer,” he said. “They played a lot better than the score was.”
Saturday against Elko, both teams played well. Alexis Jarrett nailed Fallon’s goal, sending it flying over the fingertips of Elko’s keeper. Hines said Fallon played better than the score suggested and is happy with their performance; he said they had good intensity and moved with the ball — something he noted has not happened in other matches.
“I think they’re really working hard right now, which is good,” he said.
Hines said with a number of injuries early on, he had to bring junior varsity players up to fill in. The coach also noted the team has not had many subs most of the season; he said this led to the players tiring out and developing sore muscles from playing so many matches in such a short period of time.
“I’ve been proud of the girls, they do work hard,” Hines said. “We’re just under manned right now.”