Box Score CAMPBELLSVILLE, Ky. – The Campbellsville Lady Tigers set flame to the nets Wednesday night, by scoring nine goals in their 2013 home opener over Union College, 9-4. Six goals were scored in the first 45 minutes of play and out of those six goals, three came from the foot of Aris Kuntz.
CU's nine goals are the most in a single game during the Thom Jones era and most in a decade in 90 minutes of play.
The scoring started "Var-e" early for the Lady Tigers, when freshman Mhairi Fyfe (pronounced var-e), scored her first career goal in the third minute. The goal came right after, Union's Aline Delmedico scored her first of three goals on the night and ended up getting a hat trick.
Only three minutes later, senior captain, Bailey McDonough, shot a free kick into the box that Fyfe flicked over to fellow freshman Chelsea Gill, who kicked in her first career goal.
"By the two freshmen scoring early goals for us the rest of team started to feed off that momentum," said Coach Thom Jones. "Vas (Mhairi), shot three times tonight and scored twice. I'm not a math man, but that's 66.6 percent, and we'll take that every night."
Fyfe did pick up another goal in the 18th minute, off a corner kick from McDonough. That put her total to two goals on the night.
But once the 21st minute hit, the fireworks started to happen for Campbellsville and especially Kuntz. She picked up the rebound from a missed shot by Kathryn Thomas, and scored on an open net. Seven minutes later she scored again on a pass from senior captain Jessica Ralph.
After the second goal by Kuntz, you would be lying if you didn't think about a hat trick for both Kuntz and/or Fyfe. And finally, in the 37th minute, Kuntz delivered a ball into the upper right corner of the goal and scored for the third time in the first half.
That put all the momentum on the Lady Tigers' side as they went into the locker room at halftime up 6-2.
After a much-needed break for the official scorers in the press box (because of the fast action of goals), the Lady Tigers struck again with three straight goals in the first 20 minutes of the second half. Sophomore Rachel Veatch scored her second career goal in the 46th minute, Jessica Ralph scored her 36th career goal in the 49th minute, and Kathryn Thomas scored her first career goal in the 65th minute.
Ralph has scored 36 goals in her career, but eight of the nine goals came from underclassmen.
"If teams start focusing on Jessica, it will open up opportunities for others," said Jones. "They focused on her the first half, we had six goals, and none were by her. It shows our depth at the forward position."
Jones has added a new defensive system for the Lady Tigers and only have three defensemen in the back line. But with this new addition, the Lady Tigers are going to have the opportunities to have more shots on goal and therefore score more goals. Or at least that is the thinking from Jones.
"We have struggled the past few years in scoring goals," said Jones. "Yeah, we have had one or two people doing all the scoring and it's easy to mark those players. But when you have more than two people who can score consistently, then others will feed off that and they will follow suit."
CU had nine assists on the night.
Union added two late goals by Hayley Fox and Dalmedico.
The Lady Tigers (1-0) will travel to Indiana Wesleyan on Saturday when they take on the Lady Wildcats in a 7 p.m. EDY matchup. IWU received votes in the NAIA Top-25 preseason ratings and is coming off a strong 2012 season where they finished second in the Crossroads League.
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