BY ALLEN LAMOUNTAIN

CORRESPONDENT

GREENEVILLE – In the opening minutes of the 1-AA regional opener at Fox Field, the game slipped away from the Elizabethton Lady Cyclones. Greeneville scored three goals in the first 10 minutes of the match and cruised to a 6-0 victory that advances the Lady Greene Devils to at least a sub-state match.

The Lady Cyclones (7-11-2 overall) saw their season end on a disappointing note, as they were blanked by their arch rival. EHS was held to one shot on goal as the Devils sometimes looked as if they had an extra player on the field, completely dominating possession and constantly on the attack.

“The defense did an excellent job and we are playing exceptional right now,” said Lady Greene Devils head coach John Eiskamp. “It’s been great to be able to rotate players to different positions to give us different looks. I think that is helping to energize us. We have been lucky the last couple of games to have multiple players score and not have to rely on one player to score.”

Cyclones junior goalkeeper Loran Campbell was a busy player indeed as she faced 24 shots and let just six get through. After the initial onslaught. the Cyclones played pretty well defensively, as the back line stopped several shots in front of Campbell and swept away several rebound opportunities.

“We would have liked to have had a chance to win the district,” said Lady Cyclones head coach Bill McClay. “We got runner up this year, which isn’t too bad considering it was a retooling season after losing so many seniors from last year. I think we ran into a buzz saw here in the first 10 minutes. I told the girls that we couldn’t start the game backing up mentally, and there we were, backing up.”

Sophomore Elissa McIntosh scored in the third minute on a pass across the penalty area that she was able to direct past Campbell for a 1-0 lead. Junior Jessica Sallah scored in the seventh minute as she knocked home a rebound of a hard shot by Makenzie Ellenberg for a two goal Devils advantage.

In the 10^th minute, Ellenberg scored after she settled a goal kick, took a small touch and then drilled a rocket into the EHS net for a lightning quick 3-0 lead.

“The plan coming in was to try and get on the board quickly,” Eiskamp said. “We wanted to just apply continuous pressure on them and string passes together and mainly to just keep on the attack.”

Campbell made several spectacular saves for the Cyclones until the 36^thminute when senior Lexie Gregg was able to put a left footed shot past a diving Campbell to stake Greeneville to a four-goal halftime lead.

EHS was far better at marking up their opponent and not allowing open space. That slowed the Greeneville attack quite a bit, but the Cyclones were not able to mount an attack of any consequence, with their only shot on goal coming on a free kick near midfield by Kim Henson. She fired a long range shot that Kelsey Kershaw handled cleanly.

“I felt like we played much better after the first 10-minutes,” McClay said. “How long was it before they scored the fourth goal? It’s the same team out there, you’re playing a team ranked number one in the state right now and the girls know how hard it was going to be. If Greeneville goes on to win the state, we can say it took the champs to knock us out.”

The Lady Devils tallied goals in the 63^rd minute by junior Lauren Albright and in the 65^th minute as Ellenberg struck again. In the second half, Sallah twisted her left leg and did not return.

“I think she will be fine,” Eiskamp said. “She indicated she wanted to come back in, but I want her to get checked out and cleared first, but I am sure she’ll be ready to go Thursday.”

1-AA Regional

Fox Field

Greeneville 6-0

Elizabethton 0 0 – 0

Greeneville 4 2 – 6

Scoring Summary

First Half

G – E. McIntosh (assist Ellenberg) 3:00

G – Sallah (unassisted) 7:00

G – Ellenberg (unassisted) 10:00

G – Gregg (unassisted) 36:00

Second Half

G – Albright (unassisted) 63:00

G – Ellenberg (assist Galoffin) 65:00