Burnaby Central proved to be the New Westminster Hyacks’ Achilles heal.
The Central Wildcats eliminated the Hyacks from district play, downing New West 2-1 in the BurWest senior girls’ soccer final at Mercer Stadium on Tuesday.
Central, the only team to beat the Hyacks in league play, got on the board in the opening 10 minutes on Reese Wright’s first of two scores.
Wright tallied the game-winning goal with a shot from inside the 18-yard box just before halftime.
New West put the pressure on the visitors throughout the second half and finally spoiled the shutout bid with a hard strike by Celeste Bain from 35 yards out that beat the Central keeper.
“I feel really bad for the girls. This team has only been together for about a month, but they’ve really meshed well, and I believed they could make the provincials,” said Hyack head coach Wayne McCarthy in an email.
Burnaby North survived an initial scare before downing a plucky Burnaby South team 2-1 in overtime to advance to the district final in the other semi.
Jasmine Manhas gave South an early 1-0 lead before North’s Megan Lai tied things up with three minutes left in the opening half.
The two teams remained deadlocked through a scoreless second half, sending the match to extra time.
Early in the first overtime session, Allyson Dickson caught South keeper Aime Morrison slightly off her line and right-footed a long ball into the back of the net for the eventual game-winner.
“It was a lot harder than the last game (a 5-0 win in the regular season), but that is expected,” said the Dickson.
The high school district final was played Thursday (after Record deadlines).
The AAA girls’ zone playoffs begin Monday at Burnaby Lake-West at 3 p.m.
