PM East eliminates PV in girls soccer playoffs

By Pocono Mountain East head coach Michael Smith’s assessment, his team was outplayed Thursday night against Pleasant Valley.

“I thought they controlled the midfield for a big part of the game, and I thought they controlled the game for the most part,” Smith said of the Bears.

The Cardinals still found a way to win.

Pocono Mountain East made the most of its chances to pick up a 2-0 win over Pleasant Valley in the District 11 Class 4A quarterfinals.

“The thing we did is, we capitalized on a couple of our opportunities, and they didn’t,” said Smith. “Our keeper made a couple good saves. I think we probably gave up over 10 corners, which was very dangerous. I was closing my eyes every time I saw them.

“Looking at the corners, it’s definitely something we need to improve, we need to work on not giving up the corners. I thought it was a gutsy effort from our whole group. Team effort.”

Goalie Allison Bone made eight saves for the fifth-seeded Cardinals (14-6).

Bone and the Pocono Mountain East defense withstood 12 corners from the No. 4 seed Bears (14-5-2).

While the Cardinals didn’t have a corner in the contest and were outshot 8-6, a first half goal from Alyssa Hooten and senior standout Taylor Caridi’s second half score were more than enough offense to push PM East into the semifinals.

“Their first goal was a scrappy goal, we just didn’t clear the ball,” said Pleasant Valley head coach Derek Strohl. “And their second goal, was again, they kinda got positioning on us and they were able to find one of their people coming back in. It was a good finish.”

Hooten, a freshman, scored her 10th goal of the season on an assist from Amber Dailey with 4:46 remaining in the first half to give PM East a 1-0 lead.

Caridi, a Division I recruit, added to her school record total when she hammered a shot into the back of the net off an assist from Kayla Argen with 11:19 to play in the game to make it 2-0.

After playing twice during the regular season in Eastern Pennsylvania Conference Mountain Division games, Strohl knew what to expect from the Cardinals.

“We know who their scoring threats are,” Strohl said. “We try to do our best to minimize their touches, or at least their chances of creating scoring opportunities.

“They just, they found a couple chances where they kinda just broke through, and we didn’t clear the ball, and they capitalized.”

The Bears had four corners within the first five minutes of the second half, and had seven after less than 20 minutes, but were unable to get anything past Bone and the Cardinals’ defense.

“It’s just a matter of, we had chances … we had a bunch of corners, in both halves,” said Strohl. “We just gotta find a way to get people in front of the net and put it away.”

SPLIT … Pocono Mountain East won the first meeting between the two teams 2-1 in overtime. The Bears picked up a 3-0 victory on Oct. 2, a game Caridi, who had a goal in the season-opening victory, missed the second game due to injury.

READY OR NOT … The Cardinals face top-seed Parkland in the semifinals. The Trojans dispatched No. 8 seed Freedom 4-0 in their quarterfinal match on Thursday.

TAKE A BREAK … Pleasant Valley and PM East both received a bye into the quarterfinals.