By Marion Valanoski
For The Daily Item
DANVILLE -- Jenna Fisher provided the offense while Jessica Lawton was outstanding in goal as Selinsgrove downed Danville, 4-1, Monday in Heartland Athletic Conference Division I girls soccer action underneath the lights at Ironmen Stadium.
The Seals held a slim one-goal lead at half before dominating the action in the second half. Selinsgrove turned in a solid defensive effort and got outstanding play in goal by Lawton, who stopped two point-blank attempts by the Ironmen to trim their deficit and get back into the match.
"We tried to keep it simple in the second half but could not handle their quickness," Ironmen head coach Tom Craig said. "Once they got the lead, especially in the second half, and were dropping eight players back into the box, we did not do a very good job of communicating with each other and working the ball, making it that much more difficult to get off many decent shots."
Selinsgrove (10-2, 8-2) grabbed an early 1-0 when Nicole Krebs was able to find an opening behind the Danville (6-3-1, 5-3-1) defense and got off a perfect pass to Kelsey VanBuskirk with 32:50 on the clock. However, the Ironmen, who dominated the action for most of the first 15 minutes, responded with a quick drive down the field and deadlocked the score at 1-1 on Caroline Santos' drive past Lawton less than a minute later.
Danville keeper Hanna Harris came up with a huge stop with less than 10 minutes remaining in the opening half but the Seals quickness again reared its mighty head to give the visitors what would amount to the game-winning score just before half.
Fisher was able to come up with a loose ball and carried it almost the length of the field setting up what appeared to be a sure one-on-match against Harris. The junior forward was fouled and then drilled the ensuing direct kick past the Danville keeper with 7:32 left and a 2-1 lead.
"That second goal should not have happened," Craig said.
Selinsgrove's defense kept Danville's offense at bay by clogging the box with eight defenders and yet the Ironmen almost managed to tie the score when Siobhan Bross managed to weave her way through the sea of Selinsgrove players and got off a solid shot at the open net, but Lawton came up with a great sprawling save to prevent the tying score.
"We started to drop more people back after taking the lead to try and hold off the wave of players Danville was sending at us," Seals' head coach Matt Metzger said. "In the second half, we were looking to take more advantage of our speed and began looking to try and score in transition.
"Krebs really helped out by dropping back and helping out and she played a big role in getting our offense rolling after the break."
Constantly pushing the ball up the field, the Seals were rewarded when Fisher was able to outrace the defense and drill her fourth shot of the night just past Harris for an unassisted goal with 11:10 left in the match. Any hopes of a comeback for the home team were thwarted when Krebs got into the scoring parade and scored with 6:39 showing to provide Selinsgrove with an insurmountable 4-1 advantage.
The Seals held a 6-4 advantage in shots on goal while not allowing the Ironmen any corner kicks.
"We got great play from our defense and in goal from Lawton," Metzger said. "Our speed in transition played a big role in our winning tonight."
