GREENVILLE – The Greenville soccer team showed improvement Tuesday evening, but it wasn’t enough to overcome Trotwood-Madison as the Lady Wave lost the Greater Western Ohio Conference game 5-2.
Greenville coach Steve Shepard said the Lady Wave played a lot better and showed a lot more hustle against Trotwood-Madison than in the past.
“We’re finally getting aggressive,” he said. “We’re finally moving to the ball and being aggressive. We knew we were in for a speed problem tonight so we couldn’t let them get the ball and settle it. We had to press them hard. I thought we really did that tonight. That’s what kept us in the game. They’ve got some good players, and if we wouldn’t have interrupted them it could have gotten out of hand. We’re growing and getting better finally. We’re almost to the corner. We can start turning now with three games to go.”
Trotwood-Madison struck first on Tuesday as the Lady Rams scored less than seven minutes into the game for a 1-0 lead.
It remained a one-score game for more than 20 minutes until Greenville got on the scoreboard and tied the game at 1-1 with a goal by freshman Hunter Mote.
Trotwood regained the advantage five minutes later with its second goal of the night to go up 2-1, which was the score at halftime.
“Like the (Franklin Monroe) game, we held in the first half, we’re right where we needed to be, moved the ball, but we didn’t finish chances,” Shepard said. “They don’t give up many goals. There’s a reason they’re 6-6-2, and they showed it tonight. Their defense just closes people out.”
Trotwood-Madison started to pull away in the second half, beginning with a goal five minutes into the period to make it a 3-1 game. Seven minutes later Trotwood increased its lead to 4-1 and less than two minutes after that the Rams scored again for a 5-1 advantage.
“Unfortunately we cracked again in the second half,” Shepard said. “Like I said, just like the FM game. We give up three, and it’s out of reach.”
With just over 13 minutes remaining in the contest Greenville got its second goal of the night with sophomore Allie Null scoring to make it 5-2, which ended up being the final score.
Greenville fell to 0-12 overall and 0-4 in the GWOC North with Tuesday loss while Trotwood-Madison improved to 6-6-2 overall and 1-2-1 in the GWOC North.
Greenville will return to action at 6 p.m. Monday against West Carrollton. It will be the Lady Wave’s final home game of the season and their senior night.
