ROCKINGHAM — Knocking on the doorstep throughout Wednesday’s match, the Richmond Senior High School girls’ soccer team couldn’t connect against a non-conference opponent.
Hosting Asheboro High School, the Lady Raiders played their second match in as many nights. Despite being all around the goal and controlling the tempo, Richmond lost 1-0.
Both teams battled to a scoreless draw at halftime before the Lady Blue Comets scored their goal in the 57th minute.
“It was a back and forth game tonight, they’ve got a good little squad,” head coach Chris Larsen said. “Tonight’s game was very similar to our match against them last year, neck and neck the whole time.
“We had some chances we weren’t able to capitalize on,” he added. “We’re still trying to figure out how to get that last ball across the box more consistently or to take our first touch toward the keeper to take a shot off that wing. We’re getting better at it, we just need to keep practicing.”
The scoreless first half leaned in Richmond’s favor, which maintained possession in Asheboro’s defensive third for most of the time. The Lady Raiders registered five shots to the Lady Blue Comets’ three.
Sophomore Colbie Covington had two of the shots, including one in space from 15 yards with five minutes to play in the half. Senior Ashly Gonzalez and junior Mariana Gonzalez both had one shot, with Ashly Gonzalez’s mark peppering the goalkeeper in the opening few minutes.
Richmond’s best two chances to score came on a 1v1 opportunity from senior Genesis Alicea in the 39th minute and a cross from senior Hanna Smith from the right side in the closing 10 seconds.
The second half played out like much of the first 40 minutes for Richmond, especially in the opening 12 minutes. During that span, Covington made two runs down the left side and put two more shots on frame that were stopped.
Smith crossed the ball to Mariana Gonzalez for an attempt on frame and senior Mariana Mendez Mendoza just missed over the crossbar on a back post run.
Asheboro (5-1) started its scoring run down the left side of the field. In space, Jaira Arellano put her shot just out of reach of senior goalkeeper Sa’Quanna Bostic, who made a sliding attempt to block the shot.
“(Asheboro) made an adjustment at halftime that tried to keep our defenders a little more spread out,” Larsen explained. “A ball was able to get through and Quanna made a good attempt to stop it, but the shot just beat her.”
In the closing 22 minutes of regulation, Richmond continued to make runs on net. Junior Makayla Brown had a shot from the right side of the box stopped, a corner kick from junior Jentry Denson was deflected out of the danger zone and Covington sent a free kick on frame from 30 yards out.
The Lady Raiders played the final 2:02 of the match up a player when Arellano received her second yellow card. A series of crash plays into the box yielded a couple more scoring chances for Richmond, but nobody was able to connect.
“This was a good non-conference game for us,” Larsen closed. “I told the girls I think tonight was a learning experience for us. I don’t think our energy level was where it needed to be, especially being down a goal the last five or six minutes.
“We’ll take it, learn from it and see what we can do when we get back into conference play on Friday night.”
Richmond (2-4, 1-1 SAC) will return to Sandhills Athletic Conference action Friday on the road at Union Pines High School (5-2-1, 2-0 SAC). Play will start at 7 p.m.
The Richmond Observer will publish a photo gallery of Wednesday’s match soon.
