Veteran Londonderry High girls’ soccer coach Derek Dane watched his Lady Lancers up their undefeated streak to four games last week with a fine road win followed by a hard-fought tie with an undefeated opponent in another road battle.
Dane’s contingent bagged its seventh win of the 2014 campaign – moving its season record up to a superb 7-1 – with a 3-0 blanking of the host Salem High Lady Blue Devils (3-7 record) on that team’s home pitch Tuesday, Sept. 30.
Veteran star Emily Crocetti’s goal in the 17th minute of the match – set up by Kassie Moore – provided the local crew with the only tally it would end up needing to snare a win. And the score stood right at 1-0 when halftime arrived.
But Londonderry added insurance markers in period number two, with Crocetti potting a second tally 14 minutes into that half (assist to June Cranmer) and youngster Erin Barnes getting a set-up from Laurel Goding with less than a minute remaining and burying a shot of her own.
All in all, the Lady Lancers thumped 20 shots on the Salem net, and LHS goalie Jackie Luckhardt turned aside nine Salem scoring tries in contributing to the shutout win.
Keeper Luckhardt stood tall at the center of her team’s scoreless shutout against unbeaten Bedford (9-0-1) on the road Thursday, Oct. 2.
Luckhardt made a stunning 24 saves – while Bedford keeper Brooke Barrett only had to make eight – as the Londonderry side kept its tough opponent stymied offensively while also failing to tickle the twine of the Lady Bulldogs’ cage.
The Bedford bunch bounded into the match having outscored its opponents by a total tally of 23-1. Londonderry, meanwhile, collected its sixth shutout of the campaign in the deadlock.
Then, this past Monday, Oct. 6, the Lady Lancers set out on yet another road trip to Hudson to take on the host Alvirne High Lady Broncos.
And Danes’ dames continued – for a second consecutive match – to have trouble putting the ball in the opposing cage.
The Lady Lancers and Lady Broncos played to a scoreless tie – as Londonderry and Bedford had – despite the fact that the Lady Lancers throttled some 29 shots at Alvirne goalie Sammi Giannelli.
The struggling, 2-7-2 Lady Broncos, who came into the match having gone winless in their previous six games, put three shots on LHS goal-tender Luckhardt and she stifled every one of them in snaring another shutout.