Mt. Pleasant girls eliminated by No. 6 Pella

PELLA - It was a tough one for the Mt. Pleasant girls' soccer team on Wednesday in Pella. The Panthers took on the sixth-ranked Pella Lady Dutch in a regional final that ended early when the Dutch reached 10 goals to reach the mercy rule, advancing 10-0.

The Panthers came into the game after a 2-1 regional quarterfinal win over rival Fairfield, but it was an entirely new challenge playing the two-loss Dutch on their home turf field.

Mt. Pleasant kept the game tied for the first eight-and-a-half minutes of the game, but once Pella struck, they didn't stop. The Dutch scored on a header by Jacque Lensing with 31:20 left in the first half, and Macy Schulz made it 2-0 just over a minute after with a goal of her own.

'Once they got those couple in, it's just tough,” head coach Brennan Williams said after the game. 'It's tough to come back from that, and keep spirit and morale up. It was just a tough game.”

Pella continued to drill shots into the box. Ayden Ross made a few diving saves in the first half, but the onslaught of scoring attempts resulted in eight Pella goals.

Leading scorer Grace Held scored two goals for Pella, but seven different Dutch found the back of the net in the first half. At the break, the Panthers trailed 8-0.

The Lady Dutch didn't let up in the second half. Pella scored their ninth goal off a rebound with 28:40 remaining in the game, and Held ended the day with a hat trick, scoring the final goal with 16:03 showing on the clock.

'She just makes good runs and ends up one-on-one,” Coach Williams said about Pella's star. 'When we kept her in front, it was fine, but whenever we let her run through freely without any contact, that's tough to contain.”

It was the final game for four Mt. Pleasant seniors; Mary West, Lizzie Litchfield, Hannah Hess and Sadie Carrasco. West and Litchfield were both four-year starters. Hess began playing two years ago, and Carrasco joined the team this spring.

'What I told them after the game was, ‘don't let this dictate what it was like,'” Coach Williams said. 'I think this season was our most successful season record wise that we've ever had. Those girls really set the tone for the program, and pushed it to where it is at today, because it was not at this level when they first started.”

Mt. Pleasant finished the year 13-5. They were Southeast Conference champions for the second year in a row.