MURFREESBORO – The Division II-A state soccer championship match will have a lot of familiarity.
Battle Ground Academy and University School of Nashville will be playing for the fourth time this season at 6:30 p.m. Saturday at Siegel Soccer Complex. This time it will be for a state title.
The two teams reached the finals with Friday’s semifinal victories. BGA upended St. George’s 3-1 while USN pulled off a 1-0 upset win over University School of Jackson.
“We are very familiar with each other,” BGA coach Jan Morrissey said. “Who knows what Coach (Wendy) Howe will have up her sleeve. It’s going to take a lot of grit and effort.”
There will be no Midstate presence in the DII-AA finals, as both Brentwood Academy and Father Ryan suffered semifinal defeats Friday.
BGA has won two of the three matches with USN, including 1-0 in overtime most recently.
On Friday, BGA led 1-0 at halftime and was clinging to a 2-1 lead when Taylor Knight helped put things away with a goal at the 70:22 mark. Korrie Sauder (11:46) and Jamie Busch (42:39) scored earlier goals for BGA (14-5-2).
USN took advantage of its lone shot on goal when Katie Rabb found the back of the net at the 27:26 mark on an assist from Kara Jade Gordon for the game’s only score. Goalkeeper Katie Roth had seven saves.
“We knew it was going to be a hard game, and the weather didn’t help,” Howe said. “We only had one real scoring opportunity, but our two forwards (Rabb, Gordon) did a good job connecting. We did a good job finishing.
“(Roth) had some great saves. Our girls were really focused. At halftime we talked about gamesmanship, and how when we had the ball, we didn’t want to keep it long.”
GPS blanked Brentwood Academy 3-0 while Father Ryan lost 2-1 to Briarcrest.
Meredith Priest had three saves for Brentwood Academy (13-4), which had five shots on goal.
Father Ryan and Briarcrest were scoreless at halftime and the Lady Irish took the lead two minutes into the second half on Katie Jordan’s goal. However, Briarcrest (17-1-2) answered three minutes later to tie and broke the tie 10 minutes later. Carly Bledsoe had three saves for Ryan.
