Bobcats reign in inter-district match

The Saddleback women's soccer team kept its shutout streak alive with a 6-0 win against inter-district rival Irvine Valley College on Monday afternoon in the Saddleback stadium.  The Bobcats flooded the Laser net with goals while improving to 12-0-2 on the season.

Saddleback and IVC were meeting on Monday as a result of a previous postponement last week.  The Bobcats were ready for both the Lasers and the elements, taking control early and leaving no doubt.

Playing in a heavy downpour for most of the afternoon, Saddleback opened the soccer floodgates in the sixth minute when Maliyah Medley sprinted for an open ball and beat the IVC keeper for a 1-0 lead.  Medley then scored in the 14^th minute with her team-leading 18^th goal of the season off a pass from Zoe Chung and the Bobcats were off and running.

Averee Campos made the score 3-0 when she took a rebound and blasted it past the keeper in the 24^th minutes.  Four minutes later, Nadia Amin took a pass from Camryn Marshall and beat the Laser keeper for a 4-0 lead.

Saddleback added a fifth goal in the opening half when Genesis Long fed Leila Patopoff for her first goal of the season.  Adding injury to insult, Emma Snow was then taken down inside the box and put away a penalty shot in the 39^th minute for a 6-0 lead.

Saddleback had it in cruise control the rest of the way as a lot of clean jerseys were inserted into the game with two more games to play this week.  The Bobcats still controlled the play, outshooting Irvine Valley 7-4 over the final 45 minutes. 

Saddleback's shutout streak improved to a record 14 games as Olivia Wynn played all 90 minutes in goal.  The Bobcats had a scary moment at the end to keep the streak alive as Irvine Valley's Mikaela Arnone got away a solid shot in the 89^th minute, but was denied by Wynn.

Saddleback is now 12-0-2 overall and 6-0-2 in Orange Empire Conference play.  The Bobcats will play at Orange Coast College on Tuesday with a scheduled start time of 7:00 PM.  Saddleback will then return home to play Cypress College on Friday at 3:00 PM.