Girls Soccer Playoffs - Garden City Defeats NHP

The first round of playoffs started on April 20th with a match featuring number four seed Garden City against number thirteen seed New Hyde Park, a team that was nowhere near the level of their record because of the impact Covid had taken on them throughout the shortened season. The game had been scheduled to take place in Garden City but because of the events of the day the game had to be switched to NHP Memorial despite it being considered a GC home game.

Under clear blue skies, but with a steady wind, the game set up to be a typical clash of these once tough neighborhood rivals. Garden City came into the match after an up and down season that had coach Mike Heedles hoping they could ride their season ending two game winning streak into the playoffs. While NHP looked to put behind them a disappointing Covid impacted season and carry over their tough play-in win against Clarke on Friday.

Before the game Scott McAuley, assistant coach of GC, thought it was key for GC to take advantage of the wind and get an early goal so his team would settle down and get into a good rhythm.

McAuley got his wish even faster than he could ever had imagined. With just over 30 seconds into the match the Lady Trojans were awarded a free kick from just outside of 30 yards that captain Kelly Brennan fired into the net over the extended arms of NHP keeper Lauren LoCascio. And GC had the early, very early, lead that their coaches were looking for.

With an assist from the constant wind, Garden City controlled play within their offensive end of the pitch, pressing relentlessly for that elusive second goal. But it wasn’t to be as keeper LoCascio and the stout NHP defense stood tall and kept NHP in the match. The GC attack was relentless with forwards and the midfield getting into the action, with strong contributions from Alivia Gordon (#10), Isabella Vona (#20), Emily Romeo (#2), Catherine Hayes (#17), Maya Costa (#7) and Samantha Meija (#26) and several more good scoring chances on free kicks from Brennan (#11).

The second half was a more evenly played forty minutes, as both teams had their chances to get on the score sheet. New Hyde Park keeper Frising continued to be very active, keeping the score at 1-0 despite several good scoring chances. She went up high, dove to the ground, as well as standing firm in her goal area for point blank shots.

At the opposite end of the field, GC keeper Madeleine O’Connor (#66) stood tall in the goal and came up with several good saves to secure the shutout victory for Garden City. O’Connor had a lot of help from her defense with Brennan (#11), Riley O’Rourke (#16), Renee Gollisz (#4), captain Juliana Santel (#9) and captain Sydney Ehrhart (#8) all stepping up to thwart the NHP attack.

Garden City is back on the pitch, at home, on Thursday the 22nd to face number 5 seed Wantagh at 2:00.

Full NHP gallery photos can be viewed at https://zenfolio.page.link/G9x...

Full Garden City gallery photos can be viewed at https://zenfolio.page.link/jWQ...