Plum girls net early goal, add on in defeating Kiski Area in soccer 1st-round game

By: Michael Love
Monday, October 23, 2023 | 10:05 PM

The Plum girls soccer team scored in the eighth minute to open its WPIAL Class 3A first-round game against Kiski Area on Monday at Plum’s Mustangs Stadium.

The No. 2 Mustangs added on from there.

Plum had four goals at halftime and cruised to a 6-1 victory over a youthful Cavaliers squad.

“The game plan tonight was to come out with energy and get that first goal,” Plum coach Jamie Stewart said. “It’s what we had to do and what we wanted to do to set the tempo. Getting that first goal eight or nine minutes in was very important.

“Then it was about just putting the foot down and continuing to play the way we wanted to, and we did. I thought we played pretty well in the first half.”

Monday’s game was a rematch of a first-round game from last year won by the Mustangs, 9-0.

Plum, which upped its record to 16-0-1, again is in the quarterfinals.

A rematch from the regular season was a guarantee if the Mustangs advanced, and they will take on No. 7 Montour on Thursday at a site and time to be determined. The Spartans scored with 13 seconds left in the second overtime to defeat No. 10 Franklin Regional, 1-0.

Plum and Montour met Sept. 9 at Plum, and, after two overtimes, the game ended 2-2.

“With the playoffs, you worry about the game right in front of you,” Stewart said. “This one is over, and now we focus on Thursday. We know it’s going to be a big challenge. We’re going to have to bring our ‘A’ game.”

Plum has outscored its first-round opponents 28-1 the past four years.

The last team to defeat the Mustangs in the WPIAL first round was Kiski Area at Kiski in 2018. The next year, Plum, in its first WPIAL contest, edged Gateway, 2-1, on penalty kicks.

With the big lead in the latter half of the second half Monday, the Mustangs coaches began subbing their starters. The Cavaliers coaches followed suit.

Kiski Area, with no seniors and seven freshmen or sophomores in the starting lineup, capped its season at 7-10-2. The Cavaliers, the fourth-place team from Section 3, have no seniors on their roster.

“There were some nerves coming in,” Kiski Area coach Dave Anderson said. “You could tell it on some of their faces. We faced some really good teams (in the regular season), but the playoffs is a different atmosphere. This was a good experience for the girls. They already are talking about coming back and getting here again.

“Plum is so talented. The movement up top is fantastic. They clearly have a game plan, and they feed off of each other and execute with precision.”

Kiski Area made Plum earn its offense in the early going, but the Mustangs broke through in the eighth minute.

Senior Rayla Smith came down the right wing and crossed the ball to fellow senior Ava Weleski, who buried a shot to the left side of the Kiski Area goal. It was Plum’s first shot of the game.

The Mustangs finished with a 15-5 advantage in shots and 10-3 in shots on goal.

Kiski Area’s first shot came in the 11th minute on a free kick from junior Alexis Zidek. The ball came right to Plum junior keeper Makenna Anderson, who made the save.

Sophomore Gianna Revetta made it 2-0 in the 18th minute and then assisted Weleski’s second goal about 30 seconds later.

Revetta tallied her second with 17:01 left in the first half, a header off a corner kick from sophomore Olivia Bigger.

Smith again fed Weleski with 31:04 left in regulation, and Weleski tallied her fourth of the game a little more than six minutes later off an assist from freshman Emily Grubich to cap the Plum scoring.

Kiski Area avoided the shutout as freshman Katlin Higgins scored with 10 seconds left.

“(Kiski) came out in the second half with a lot more energy in the first five (minutes) than I would’ve liked,” Stewart said. “We did not have the energy. But then we started to pick it up. It was a nice chance to get some of our other girls into the game.”

Michael Love is a TribLive reporter covering sports in the Alle-Kiski Valley and the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh. A Clearfield native and a graduate of Westminster (Pa.), he joined the Trib in 2002 after spending five years at the Clearfield Progress. He can be reached at mlove@triblive.com.

Tags: Kiski Area, Plum