SPRINGDALE — Fans went crazy in the Shiloh Christian parking lot, flashing their lights and blowing their car horns, after freshman Caroline Bandy scored her third goal and completed a hat trick.
With rain falling, wind blowing and temperatures in the 30s, fans moved from the stands to their cars to watch the game in warmth as Shiloh Christian defeated Greenbrier 3-1 on Tuesday evening.
“I joked with the girls that their parents are kind of wimps out there in the parking lot,” Shiloh Christian coach Tommy Roy said. “But you know, if I could coach the game in the press box over the loud speaker, I probably would have done it tonight.”
The first half was slow for both teams, with Roy attributing his team’s performance to the fact it hadn’t played a game in more than two weeks.
Girls Prep Soccer
Shiloh Christian 3, Greenbrier 1
Greenbrier 0 1 — 1
Shiloh Christian 0 3 — 3
Second Half
SHI — Bandy, 39:12
SHI — Bandy 26:28
GRE — Johnson, 20:22
SHI — Bandy, 17:20
“We haven’t played in 18 days, and I thought the rust showed in the first half,” Roy said.
With seven minutes left in the first half, both teams took a big hit. Shiloh Christian’s goalie Paulina Doubleday went down after a corner kick, and Greenbrier senior Marlo Stacy received a red card and subsequently was ejected from the game.
“When we lose what is probably our best player in the first half, that affects everybody,” Greenbrier coach T.J. Slough said. “I was proud of our girls playing a man down. We never had any heads hanging, and we never had us a pity party.”
Roy said he was also impressed with how his team responded after losing its goalie.
“I thought Kaylee Cochran, who hasn’t played goalie for us in almost three years, filled in and played a great game in the net after Paulina went down,” Roy said.
After the emotional finale to the first half left the game tied at 0-0, it was anybody’s game heading into the second half.
The Lady Saints showed how much they wanted it with Bandy scoring the game’s first goal in the first minute.
Bandy scored again in the 26th minute with a line drive 15 yards out into the back right corner of the net.
“She’s very savvy for a ninth grader,” Roy said. “It’s always good when you can get a player like her.”
Kady Johnson scored Greenbrier’s (2-1, 9-4) first and only goal of the game in the 20th minute of the second half, but Shiloh Christian (2-1, 5-2) responded a few minutes later with Bandy scoring her third goal of the game.
“It’s a big win for us,” Roy said. “That puts us in the No. 2 spot for conference. So it was a quality win even though it wasn’t pretty at times.”