Hollis Brookline girls soccer comes back in second half to beat Merrimack Valley

PENACOOK - With senior tri-captain and last year’s leading goal-scorer Tasha White injured, the Hollis Brookline High School girls soccer team succeeded with a different offensive approach in its 2-1 Division II victory at Merrimack Valley on Wednesday.

Cavaliers coach Peter Clarke said his team was used to White, who is out for six weeks with a knee injury she sustained last Friday against Souhegan, creating offensive opportunities all on her own. Without White, HB (4-1) used its speed, combination play and two goals from Paige Magnuszewski to earn its comeback win over the Pride.

“We used to rely on Tasha to get the job done herself so it’s taken time to adapt and get the supporting runs from behind that No. 9 player,” Clarke said. “That’s what we started to see (Wednesday).”

The Pride (1-4) entered halftime with a 1-0 lead and held possession for most of the opening eight minutes of the second half but HB regained control in the 50th minute and found the equalizer four minutes later. 

Magnuszewski drew a penalty kick in the 54th minute after she was tackled in the penalty box and found the back of the net with her low shot to the left corner, knotting the score at 1-1. The midfielder followed up with the game-winning goal in the 59th minute, when she scored from the box off a through-ball assist from Rachel Brackett.

“We needed a spark to believe in ourselves a little bit again because over the last few days we’ve been struggling,” Clarke said. “And that definitely woke us up. Credit to (Magnuszewski).

“And we looked so much better after that - for the remainder of the game until we fell into this defensive mode for the last five (minutes).”

Merrimack Valley had a flurry of offense over the last five minutes, highlighted by Alyssa Woodman’s shot inside the box with about 30 seconds remaining. Teammate Kaylee Magoon saw her promising shot in the 72nd minute sail just wide of the far post.

“I think, second half, we saw the difference of an experienced team to a younger team,” said Merrimack Valley coach Nick D’Agostino, who has 12 underclassmen on his roster. “We battled, we had some looks late on but there was a good 15-minute stretch where (HB) came at us pretty good and you could kind of feel it. There wasn’t really a lot we could do even substitution-wise.”

Despite having a clear possession edge, a 5-2 shots-on-goal advantage and six corner kicks over the opening 40 minutes, the Cavaliers trailed, 1-0, at halftime. Merrimack Valley opened the game’s scoring in the 25th minute, when senior captain Miah Boucher converted her penalty-kick try after teammate Kristen Therrien was tackled in the penalty box. 

The Cavaliers finished with a 10-4 shots-on-goal advantage and drew six corner kicks to Merrimack Valley’s one. Mackenzie McDonald made eight saves for the Pride. HB goalkeeper Maggie Crooks made two saves.

“(White’s) loss has been a big one to take emotionally for the girls when you have a captain and a leading goal-scorer go down,” Clarke said. “We’ve been strong the last couple years, we only lost a couple of players and we thought this year might be the one where we find a spark that gets us into that final four. I feel good about it now after this last 35 minutes (from) what I saw up front that maybe we can get it going.”