The Batesville Lady Bulldogs participated in the Plainfield Invitational for the 1st time on Saturday. After two tough fought matches, the Lady Bulldogs were victorious and brought home the trophy to Batesville High School.
In the first matchup for the day, the Lady Bulldogs were paired up against the Lady Trojans from Indianapolis Bishop Chatard. It was an outstanding performance by senior forward, Taylor Rowlett as she recored her 2nd consecutive hat trick and has now scored 10 goals in the early season. The first goal came in the middle of the first half on a great individual effort by Rowlett. She was able to get around 2 defenders and put away the shot from the corner of the 18 yard box.
Batesville went up 2-0 in the 2nd half as Rowlett was taken out inside the box to earn the penalty. Rowlett converted on the PK. After a deep foul in the Lady Bulldog territory, the Lady Trojans made it a 1-goal difference again after a perfectly placed direct kick from distance sailed over Olive Cerniglia’s outreached hands into the back of the net. Rowlett gave the Lady Dogs a little breathing room late in the match with a breakaway goal off an assist from Carlie Werner. The Batesville defense played a great match and limited the Chatard offense for the majority of the match. “This was a great team win and a fun win for us. We look forward to these challenging matchups and it was nice to walk away with the 3-1 win.” – Coach Laker.
After Plainfield defeated Covenant Christian, the championship was setup between the Lady Bulldogs from Batesville against the Lady Quakers from Plainfield. Both teams had some tired legs as they battled for 80 more minutes of hard fought soccer. Batesville jumped out to a 2-0 lead in the first half. Gabi Garcia found Abbey Prickel making a diagonal run from the right wing and led her into space behind the defense and Prickel capitalized with a nicely placed shot to the far post. The 2nd goal came off a great combination play between Rowlett and Carlie Werner. Werner dribbled on the left side line, dished it off to Rowlett who dribbled past 2 defenders and gave it back to Werner at the penalty spot for a 1-touch rocket into the back of the net.
Much to their credit, the Lady Quakers did not give up and were able to make it 2-1 entering the half with a nice cross into the box that was deflected to the back post and finished by Grace Mathews with 30 seconds to play in the first stanza.
Plainfield found their equalizer with 20 minutes left to play in the game. This time it was a great individual effort Madison Smith as she was able to break down the Batesville defense and fired a shot past the dive from senior goalkeeper, Molly Wintz. With the game tied 2-2, Batesville went back to work and continued to fight for the last 15 minutes. The Lady Quakers fouled a Batesville player just outside the box and the Lady Bulldogs would capitalize. Liz Heidlage stepped up and hit a perfect free kick to the back side of the goal and past the Plainfield GK for the game winning goal.
“This was a hard fought championship and the girls really deserved to hoist that trophy after the way they fought today. Plainfield and Chatard were both good teams and we got better today playing this type of competition.” Bulldogs Coach Kyle Laker.
Photo courtesy of Bulldogs Senior Parent Denise Wintz.