Athens Drive girls soccer overwhelms East Wake

Athens Drive captain and senior forward Rachel Snyder led the way for the Jaguars’ girls soccer team on Thursday, scoring a hat trick in a 6-0 shutout victory over East Wake. The Jaguars started off slow, but gradually pulled away late.

Athens Drive freshman Bethel Belayneh allowed the Jaguars to get on the board first with a goal in the 13th minute to put the Jaguars up 1-0. It was all Snyder the rest of the half as she scored a goal in the 18th and 37th minutes to put Athens Drive up 3-0 going into halftime.

“I was pretty happy with the result, we’ve had a tough stretch here lately, and we’ve been playing pretty well, but it was good to get out here and get through this three-day week because three-day weeks are pretty tough,” said Athens Drive coach Travis Seese.

Athens Drive (9-4-3), winners of seven of their last 10 contests, just needed 45 seconds to start the second half to get back on the board as Snyder scored her third and final goal to complete the hat trick and put the Jaguars up 4-0.

Just a minute later, Snyder was part of another Jaguars goal with an assist to sophomore midfielder Shayna McKinnon. With just eight minutes remaining in the game, McKinnon placed a corner kick off of an East Wake defender for the final goal.

“The girls play really well together and they play hard, they like playing with each other and it reflects on the field,” Seese said. “The last few weeks, they’ve been putting it together and we’ve been getting some pretty good results.”

Despite the outcome on the scoreboard, East Wake’s sophomore goalkeeper Olivia Huffman was superb. Athens Drive accumulated 22 shots on goal and Huffman picked up 16 saves. Huffman also stopped a penalty kick in the beginning of the first half to keep the score knotted at zero.

With 11 minutes remaining in the game, the Warriors had a breakaway, but Athens Drive sophomore goalkeeper Mary Grace Bunch made huge save to keep the Warriors off the board.

East Wake (1-16) has only three seniors and is a very young team, but the future looks bright for the Warriors.

“I thought we played a much better first half than second half,” said East Wake coach Michael Howes. “Even though there were three goals scored in each half, I thought my girls played stronger in the first half and had a few more offensive runs.

“Their spirits are up and they really enjoy each other. They come to practice and work hard, it’s just that we’re a little outmatched right now.”

This story was originally published April 22, 2016 at 10:43 PM with the headline "Athens Drive girls soccer overwhelms East Wake."