Cloak, Harding spearhead victory by Eagles

ELLSWORTH – The 28 jack-o’-lanterns lined up behind the Ellsworth girls soccer team’s bench Wednesday night didn’t make for a scary sight as most were painted with happy faces.

The game itself, however, was downright frightful for the visiting Rockland Tigers as the host Eagles erupted for five goals in the first half. As the seconds ticked off in Ellsworth’s 7-1 Eastern Maine Class B preliminary victory, the only happy faces were on Ellsworth players and fans.

The happiest among them belonged to juniors Ashley Cloak and Maggie Harding, who combined to produce four goals and an assist in the Eagles’ highest-scoring game of the season.

“We’re peaking at the right time,” said Eagles head coach Jennifer Myers. “We struggled early on, but we moved some girls around and things seem to be clicking for us now.”

The seventh-seeded Eagles take a 9-4-2 record to Presque Isle to play the No. 2 Wildcats Saturday while No. 10 Rockland wound up its season 6-9.

“They got to us early and once we got back on our heels, it was hard to get back in the game,” said Tigers coach Brian Plourde. “We didn’t get a chance to get the ball up to Elsie [Mason] and Baillie [Boggs] and use our outside speed. The strength of our team is getting those two moving on the wings, but we had to spend too much time playing defense.”

Mason did get free once to score Rockland’s only goal on a breakaway up the middle with 3:14 left in the first half, but it wasn’t nearly enough to offset the effort of Cloak and Harding.

Harding started the Eagles off 2:17 into the game as she got the rebound of her own missed shot off a feed from Lauren Peer and dribbled a shot into the left corner of the goal.

Cloak then scored back-to-back goals, first with a shot to the left side of the net off a long and high corner kick by Emily Lyons and redirect from Catherine Carter just 3:46 into the game and then with a shot to the right side of the net that went off a Rockland defender seven minutes later. Peer notched an assist on that goal as well.

“We’re all playing well together and it’s all coming together really well right now,” Cloak said.

Cloak also had a hand in the next goal with 18:51 left in the first. Jen Richter scored from about 20 feet out on a shot to the right side off a precise feed from Cloak, who was stationed 40 feet out on the left middle side of the field.

Freshman Ashley Smith capped Ellsworth’s first-half scoring with a goal off a great lead pass from Sarah Homich with 12:28 left.

Harding started the scoring in the second half as well with a highlight-reel goal. The forward scored on a diagonal drive to the left side of the field -on the run – with a shot across her body and against her momentum to the right of the net.

“That’s my favorite shot,” Harding said. “I didn’t think I’d come close to making that second one, but it went in.”

Harding said a few switches to the lineup have geared up Ellsworth’s offensive attack.

“We changed our formation up a lot. Today I played striker-midfielder,” Harding said. “I dropped back to help the midfield out if they needed it and we changed our flat four and made a sweeper-stopper.”

Forward Kelsey Crowley scored the final goal off a nice cross from the left side by fellow senior Jen Richter with 14:33 left.

Ellsworth outshot Rockland 22-3. Eagles goalies Rachel Arkin and Angie Tucker combined for two saves while Tigers goalies Kayla McGuire and Joelle Joyce totaled 14.