BANGOR, Maine — The Bangor High School girls soccer team earned the top seed for the Class A North soccer playoffs on Tuesday night as the Rams used four second-half goals to beat arch-rival Brewer 5-1 on Seniors Night at Cameron Stadium.
Junior midfielder Clara Oldenburg had three goals and an assist and senior midfielder Teagan Atherley had a goal and three assists as the Rams won their 11th straight game to finish the regular season at 13-1.
Bangor will host eighth seed Skowhegan, 4-8-2, on Tuesday in the quarterfinals.
Brewer wound up 8-5-1 and will be the fifth seed which will send the Witches to No. 4 Brunswick, also 8-5-1, for their quarterfinal matchup.
It was only Brewer’s second loss over its last 10 games (7-2-1).
Bangor junior forward Maddie McLean scored the only goal in the first half off an Atherley feed.
Oldenburg expanded the lead to 2-0 just 7:32 into the second half, but Brewer senior striker Lauren Vanidestine answered just 47 seconds later.
Atherley restored the two-goal lead off a nice through ball by Oldenburg and fed Oldenburg for the game’s final two goals.
Bangor coach Jay Kemble said Atherley and Oldenburg are a great combination.
“They’re both really, really athletic. They’re both really skilled and they have high soccer IQs. They know where each other is on the field at all times,” Kemble said.
“We’ve grown pretty close. Our chemistry has gotten a lot better,” Atherley said.
McLean opened the scoring at the 23:32 mark of the first half.
Atherley had the ball on the left side of the penalty area and zipped a pass across to the far post where McLean easily steered it into the open net from three yards out for her second goal of the season.
“I thought I might have been offsides but I didn’t end up being offsides, which was good,” McLean said. “I wasn’t sure if Teagan was going to shoot it or not so I decided to step in and act like she was not going to finish it and take it as a pass.”
Atherley rattled a powerful shot off the near post later in the half, but the Witches did an exceptional job limiting Bangor’s high-percentage shots in the first half as they allowed Bangor to have the vast majority of possession but would get numbers behind the ball when the Rams reached the attacking third and the penalty area to clog things up.
“We talked about being a little more patient. Making the defense have to rotate and then trying to work some through balls from there. Our kids are so aggressive and skilled that their patience paid off. We had a couple of good runs and good back passes and were able to get some good strikes on the ball,” Kemble said.
Oldeburg made it 2-0 when her shot from the top of the penalty area deflected off a Brewer defender and changed directions, leaving junior goalkeeper Gabby Chasse helpless.
“I wasn’t on the right foot so I just took the shot and the defender deflected it at a weird angle and the goalie wasn’t ready for it,” Oldenburg said.
Vanidestine scored off a scramble in the box. She didn’t get much on her shot but it bounced past Bangor goalie Eva Coombs.
Atherley gave the Rams some breathing room when she raced onto a perfect feed from Oldenburg and beat Chasse in a one-on-one.
“There wasn’t anyone around me so I had a lot of time and space. I took my time and got off a good shot,” said Atherley, whose goal was her 30th of the season.
Oldenburg made it 4-1 when she took an Atherley pass at the top of the penalty area and unleashed a rising shot that nestled into the top corner to Chasse’s left.
On her third of the night and 23rd of the season, Oldenburg slotted a hard, low shot into the corner to Chasse’s right.
“Teagan made a great run and drew in all the defenders in [on the fourth Bangor goal] and that left me unmarked. [On the fifth one], she kind of did the same thing. I made a run and put it to Teagan and she ended up playing it back to me. So she had drawn the defenders [to her] again,” Oldenburg said.
Coombs finished with one save on four Witch shot attempts while Chasse finished with eight saves on 25 Bangor attempts.
