Newtown Girls Come Up Short In Southbury

By Andy Hutchison

SOUTHBURY — Fighting to keep their South-West Tournament title hopes alive, Newtown High School’s girls’ soccer team did everything but score the tying goal in the late stages of the October 30 quarterfinal round game at Pomperaug. The seventh-seeded Nighthawks fell 2-1 to the No. 2 Panthers on a chilly night in which the Hawks fell behind 2-0 before putting together a comeback bid that fell short.

Brittany Tolla scored to pull the Hawks to within a goal and Newtown kept applying pressure on the Panthers, narrowly missing multiple chances to deadlock the score.

Lauren Meyer set up her teammates with a few chances on late-game corner kicks. Maddy Keane got her head on a deflected ball and put it on goal but was denied, and later booted a ball off a corner that got past Pomperaug’s goalkeeper and appeared headed for the bottom right corner of the net. A Pomperaug defender, however, blocked the shot. Then, off yet another corner kick setup, Amy Martin nearly deposited a rebound but her shot clanked off the right post, leaving the Nighthawks wondering what it would take to score.

“I thought we had our chances in the second half. I thought we were outstanding in the second half — just the soccer gods weren’t smiling on us today,” Newtown Coach Marc Kenney said. “I mean the post — I thought that ball was in and, obviously, Maddy Keane on the corner kick. … That was hammered and that was a great save by their outside [defender].”

The Nighthawks had six corner kicks in the game, four of which came in the final 20-or-so minutes as they kept trying to get that tying tally. In the end, Newtown was outshot 13-10.

Newtown has been battling injuries all season and Keane played through pain after hurting her foot in the first half.

The Nighthawks would prefer to limp through the semifinals and into the SWC’s championship round but, instead, they will have to rest and prepare for the start of state tournament competition in the second week of November.