JONESBOROUGH – Juniors Kaylen Shell and Cami Davison each had a three-goal hat trick, and the Elizabethton Lady Cyclones set a few school records on Thursday evening in their 6-nil whitewashing of David Crockett in girls soccer at Pioneer Stadium.
The Cyclones set records for wins in a regular season (11), goals for (80) and fewest goals against (17) and Shell moved into third place as the school’s all-time goal scorer with 53 to date after scoring 29 goals in the regular season.
“There are several things we accomplished this season,” stated Lady Cyclones head coach Bill McClay. “Eighty goals is a regular season record, and 11 wins is something we had never done. We had teams with 10 wins before, and the team that went to state won nine regular-season games then reeled off four postseason wins.”
The Cyclones (11-4, 4-1 conference) got started early with Shell scoring in the fourth minute with an assist from junior Lexi Brown. Davison collected her first goal in the eighth minute of play beating Crockett goalkeeper Alyssa Suits after getting a steal in the Crockett penalty area.
Davison now has 23 goals this season after a freshman year in which she led the team in goals, but did not opt to play her sophomore season. For EHS this match marked the seventh shutout for junior goalkeeper Baylee Creasy who is playing the position for the first time this season.
Senior defender Cassidy Kaldy said of this season’s defensive efforts, “We started with four and moved to a new position with five and we adapted really well. The outside girls have gotten better at their runs to help out the offense, but we have also gotten better with our speed in getting back on defense. We have been starting to push the outside defenders up more to help on crosses.”
Shell completed her hat trick with goals in the 11th and 22nd minutes of the first half to stake the Cyclones to a four-goal halftime advantage. In the second half, Davison scored with an assist from Kaldy in the 47th minute of play and topped off the scoring as she put in the rebound of a corner kick from senior Abbey Townsend.
Townsend fired from the corner and Suits was able to make the stop, but the rebound came to Brown, and she found Davison positioned at the goal line and Davison was able to finish the play.
The Cyclones will play in the District 1-2A playoffs beginning on Tuesday against the winner of Monday’s contest between Unicoi County and Sullivan Central. A win on Tuesday puts the Cyclones into the regional tournament for the first time since 2016 when they fell to Greeneville.
EHS 6-0
Elizabethton 4 2 – 6
Crockett 0 0 – 0
Scoring summary
First Half
E – Shell (assist Brown) 4:00
E – Davison (unassisted) 8:00
E – Shell (unassisted) 11:00
E – Shell (unassisted) 22:00
Second Half
E – Davison (assist Kaldy) 47:00
E – Davison (assist Brown) 61:00