Mustangs defeat Red Raiders on penalty kicks after 1-1 tie at Carey Stadium
OCEAN CITY — The fourth time was a charm for the Mainland Regional High School girls soccer team, which upset top seed Ocean City High School 5-4 on penalty kicks Tuesday in the semifinal round of the NJSIAA South Jersey Group III playoffs.
The Red Raiders’ Summer Reimet opened the scoring with 5:48 remaining in the first half and the Mustangs’ Julie Kaes equalized at 28:06 of the second from outside the box.
Following two scoreless overtime periods, the game came down to penalty kicks, with Mainland netting 4 and Ocean City 3. Mustang Alyssa Turner scored the walk-off game-winner and goalkeeper Genevieve Morrison saved 2 of the 5 shots for the victory.
It was as dramatic a penalty shootout as possible, coming down to the 10th kick.
Ocean City midfielder Hope Slimmer was up first, shooting low to the right of Morrison, who made a diving save.
“It was kind of unbelievable at that point because you just stopped the first shot,” Morrison said. “It’s nice to feel that you are one up on them and that you have that save behind you.”
Senior captain Camryn Dirkes stepped up for the Mustangs and scored top right on Red Raider goalkeeper Tori Vliet, taking a 1-0 lead. Next up, Reimet made her second of the contest, scoring to Morrison’s right to make it 1-1.
Mainland forward Kylie Smith fired her shot over the bar, losing the advantage from Morrison’s save. Ocean City’s Kasey McDonell then put the Red Raiders up 2-1 for their first lead, but Sydney Kaes hit the back of the net to level.
Up next was Joy Slimmer, who retook the lead for Ocean City 3-2. However, Mainland’s Julia Kaes scored her second of the contest off the hands of Vliet to tie it again.
Riley Fortna, who started on the defense as a freshman, stepped up for the team’s final kick and fired low, but Morrison once again made the stop. The sophomore goalie ran out in celebration before realizing it wasn’t over yet.
“It felt really good. We had missed one but it felt great to save another one and keep us ahead,” Morrison said.
With the game on the line, Turner fired her shot home, securing the victory.
The cross-bay rivals have split their four meetings this season, including a 2-0 win by the Red Raiders in the Cape-Atlantic League title game and a last-second 1-0 win by the Mustangs, but Mainland won the one that counted the most.
The fifth seed with a record of 16-4-2, Mainland will face third-seeded Lacey Township High School, 15-6-1, in the South Jersey final at 10 a.m. Saturday in Lanoka Harbor.
Despite being double- and triple-teamed the entire match, Summer Reimet, who has the most single-season and career (131) goals for the Red Raiders, scored her 62nd of the campaign with 5:48 left in the first half.
After being held in check for much of the match and being forced to shoot from distance, Reimet started to wear down the defense toward the end of the half.
Midfielder McKenna Chisholm finally got Reimet the ball where she had a little room to work, and the senior, who is headed to Monmouth University in January, made no mistake, slamming the ball from the right side into the left netting to take a 1-0 lead.
The Mustangs didn’t hang their heads, coming out in the second half and controlling the ball and the tempo. Dirkes had a good chance off a steal to open the stanza as well as a free kick from about 36 yards out that forced Ocean City goalkeeper Tori Vliet to make a diving save at 31:30. That led to Mainland getting a couple of corner kicks but still nothing to show for their effort.
“You could just see that we wanted it. We’re seniors and this could have been our last game and we played until the whistle blew,” Kaes said. “It feels great. It’s like a rush of excitement right now because we worked hard season to get this and we knew we were going to get it.”
Making an overlapping run from her defensive back position, Emily Paytas connected with Kaes down the left side and she fired it home for the equalizer at 28:06.
“It was a buildup of teamwork and we got the ball. We were possessing the ball, we were outplaying them the whole half, so it was bound to come and I was just the one to finish it,” Kaes said. “It was a team effort and we all scored that, in my opinion.”
“This is why Emily Paytas is dangerous. She plays at outside back but made an overlapping run, got into the attack and had a beautiful assist in the middle on a fantastic play,” head coach Chris Meade said.
Dirkes agreed the team wanted it more.
“One thing that stuck with me, going into the second overtime Lynn McLaughlin, a sophomore, I went and I said ‘don’t look tired, you can’t look tired. You gotta come out and just pretend, even if you just pretend we’re not tired it shows.’ She goes, ‘what do you mean, Cam? We’re not tired,’ and I think that was our mentality and what really pushed us into the second overtime,” Dirkes said. “We kept giving it our all. Everyone worked together and it was a real team effort.”
The Mustangs nearly took the lead shortly after Kaes scored when Paytas shot a high arcing ball from distance that bounced off the top of the crossbar at 21:58.
“Toward the middle, as we were starting to gain momentum and we got that nice overlapping goal, I thought we had the better of the play and much more energy. I think we were starting to win balls and to keep possession and the ball was flowing down our end a little more,” Meade said.
Mainland continued to put the pressure on, with Turner taking a free kick from the side of the box about 8 yards from the endline that resulted in an unsuccessful corner kick.
Defender Sydney Kaes said they made a concerted effort to stop Reimet.
“I think that we all just played with more heart and we wanted it at the end more. I feel like we played as a team and knew what we were expecting and did a good job to keeping her to limited shots,” she said.
With Reimet drawing all of the attention, Ocean City’s Chisholm and freshman Naomi Nnewihe were getting more chances. Nnewihe’s speed and ball-handling skills more than once put a scare into the defense, but it proved up to the task.
Midfielder Hope Slimmer, who leads the team in single-season (43, 2021) and career (80) assists, almost opened the scoring at 13:24 when she fired a shot across the face of the goal, beating Morrison but clanking the ball off the post. Morrison made a diving save on the rebound.
Morrison made 12 saves for Mainland on 18 shots and Vliet made 9 for Ocean City on 15 shots.
Ocean City finished its season 21-1-1.
Red Raider head coach Lisa Cuneo said the loss hurt, even more so to the Mustangs.
“Obviously it is worse because they’re our rival but that’s soccer — someone’s got to win and someone’s got to go home,” Cuneo said.
She feels her team did not play its best game, blaming the heated rivalry between the teams.
“Maybe that’s what Mainland does to us, gets us a little nervous and it’s on us to rise to the occasion,” she said. “We had plenty of opportunities but you’ve just got to finish.”
Losing three of her top players — Reimet, Hope Slimmer and Kasey McDonell — is going to take a toll next season but Cuneo is confident in the younger players coming up.
“It’s going to sting for a little bit but we’ve got a young bunch, some promise. Obviously losing Hope and Summer, we’re going to have some big holes to fill. We have some freshmen, played three all season and there’s a fourth and a fifth,” she said. “We had a fantastic season (21-1-1, 11-1 CAL), some years a team’s got your number.”
Cuneo noted the team won several trophies this season, including the South Jersey Coaches Association Tournament, a first for a Cape-Atlantic League team, and the CAL tournament.
“We got a new trophy for the trophy case. Winning that Coaches Tournament was a big deal,” she said. “The Coaches Tournament was a great win and at least something the seniors can hang their hat on. Our seniors are state champs, 2019 state champs.
“They’ll always remember that, they’ll always remember this Coaches Tournament win. They had a successful year, they can’t walk away thinking their four years here weren’t good.
“They are well-deserving of every headline, article and ranking that they received.”
