Lake Washington

Bellevue 2-1 Lake Washington

​ Finish the job. In soccer, and in life, it's a very difficult thing to do. Lots of people find joy in doing a task to 95% completion, but what often separates "good" from "great" is finishing the final 5% with the same excellence and work-rate as the previous 95% (can you tell I'm at the end of a frustrating re-model...). After playing one of our best halves of the season in a dominant 40 minutes of soccer versus league title contenders LW, that was my primary message at the break: finish the job. Nobody will remember the excellence of the first half we we fail to follow it up with a performance in the second. And although we had a slight wobble in conceding from a corner kick early the second half, the girls showed resolve and got the win against a very good LW team.   Our combination play in attack was as good as it's been all season with midfielders, fullbacks and wingers bombing into open channels and creating space for themselves or teammates. Our first goal was a thing of beauty: we patiently rotated the ball along our backline, found Ellie in the middle who made a simple turn and quick pass to Sophie who was checking from the right wing. Grace made a hard run across the LW defense behind Sophie into the right corner, dragging three LW defenders with her. Instead of giving Grace the ball, Sophie made an excellent choice in attacking the space Grace just created, dribbling inside and towards the goal. Recognizing the open space on the opposite side, Katie made a penetrating run on the left from deep in midfield, Sophie made the entry pass to Katie but it was just a touch heavy. Katie didn't give up on the ball, chased it down and dropped a perfectly weighted pass underneath to an onrushing Kiley who smashed it into the net for a 1-0 goal advantage.  What. A. Goal.  Coaches love these types of goals because almost the entire Bellevue team was involved in unselfish running and passing. When teams trust each other, and do the right things off the ball, beautiful football is the result. To point, Grace's contribution in making the right run at the right time was as just as important in shifting the defense as was Sophie's dribble, Katie's assist, or Kiley's excellent finish.   We could've, and should've, buried LW in the first half.  After two consecutive games of generating only 8 shots in total, we launched 12 shots at LW in the first half alone. But as we learned in our first game versus LW, they are a good and resilient team and answered back only three minutes into the second half. They earned a corner and sent a very dangerous curling ball towards our goal that just crossed the line to give the Kangs' a lifeline. The next 10 minutes were fiercely contested as LW were re-energized by their equalizer. But we steadily regained control of the game, and the winning goal came in the 59th minute. This time we used "route one," the most direct path to an opponents goal, as Sophie won the ball at midfield, and immediately found Grace with a 40 yard ball behind the LW defense. The Kangs' goalkeeper rushed out of her goal, but misjudged Grace's speed, and had to watch helplessly as our striker skillfully lobbed the ball over her head and into the open net. 2-1 Bellevue. And pole position for the league regular season title race that ends next week.   Finish the job. Doing 95% of a task can leave a bitter taste if the last 5% is neglected. I was proud of our girls for finishing the game off last night and earning a very well deserved victory.          Highlights Madi George. Madi George. Madi George.    The LW no10, Sakky Yoshida, must have thought she had scored when the free kick left her foot. She hit a hard driven ball to the exact same place where she had scored over Madi's outstretched hands in our first game in Bellevue. But unlike that free kick back in September, Madi was in a better starting position and leaped upwards and pinned the ball against the crossbar for a magnificent save. There is so much to love about this moment. Madi learned from her early experience, made adjustments, and was in the right place at the right time to make the save the second time. Try new things..fail occasionally...learn...improve...succeed. Of course, this would be a completely different recap if Madi hadn't made an equally important save with only 5 minutes left in the game as the LW red-headed freshman striker got free for the first time all night, sprinted at Madi, and Madi stone-walled her at the near post to preserve our victory. So sweet. And again, a save that was born from tough lessons earlier in the season;    I couldn't be happier to see Grace's name back on the scoresheet in such dramatic fashion, but almost as important as her composed finish, was her overall performance. She pressed hard all night, made great runs off the ball, and launched 8 shots at the LW keeper to lead the team in chances; LW has the most prolific offense in our league, with 45 goals scored this season, so our collective defense deserves recognition for restricting the Kangs to just a few chances on the night. Nikole and Paige were fantastic in closing down their opposites, and getting forward down our wings. We are a much more dangerous team when our fullbacks get involved in our attack; Maud & Catie were their usual dominating selves, never allowing the pacey LW forwards enough space or time to operate;  finally, on her birthday, I thought Ellie B had her best game of the season. She was everywhere in midfield, blowing up LW attacks with hard tackles, winning the aerial battles, and distributing the ball with patience and poise. Alongside her midfield compatriot Katie, our captains held down the middle of the park against a team that typically enjoys more freedom and joy in possession. But Ellie and Katie made sure that joyful dribbling wasn't in the script for the LW midfielders, consistently disrupting their playmaking attempts.    Three games left in our regular season. We are almost through the first phase of our goal-setting achievements, and we are exactly where we want to be in the league table. We are undeniably a good team. However, to be great, we need to finish the job. Approach our last three games with the same intensity as we showed against LW last night.    Next up: away at Interlake on Thursday. A team that we narrowly defeated at home by a lone goal in the final moments of the game.     Finish the job.  FTJ