GRATERFORD — Start hungry, finish full.
It’s a motto the Perkiomen Valley girls’ soccer team is trying to play by this fall, the Vikings looking to leave every match stuffed after a win. Their first meeting with Owen J. Roberts on Sept. 3 left the Vikings still starving when it ended, so they wanted the full course meal in Thursday’s rematch.
Brianna Young and Giavanna Marciano took care of the offense and Anna Mecouch’s heroics in goal made sure PV left full with a 3-0 win.
“I think that really showed tonight,” Mecouch said.
PV’s win ran their win streak to seven in a row while also snapping OJR’s 10-match win streak, one that started with that 2-1 overtime win against the Vikings back at the start of PAC play. The result also added some intrigue to the PAC Liberty Division table, with the Wildcats taking their first league loss to now sit even with Spring-Ford at 8-1-0 while 7-2-0 PV stayed in third but just a game back in the loss column.
While the hosts finished with a three-goal advantage, the match was tight until Young and Marciano broke it open with back-to-back goals a couple minutes apart midway through the second half. Perk Valley did nab an early goal about 10 minutes in but it was largely the work of senior co-captain Mecouch between the posts that kept it that way.
Mecouch was stellar in goal, making nine saves with several of them from point-blank range, to deny a Wildcats front line that was active and threatening all match long.
“At some point when you’re a goalie, the goal just becomes a part of you,” Mecouch said. “It becomes easier to read the game, if my post is there then I know what’s behind me. You can just feel it without even seeing it.”
OJR, last year’s PAC champion, had firmly been on a roll after starting 0-3. It’s not like the Wildcats played lightweights in that span, facing Downingtown East and West plus Pennridge, but their gutsy win in extra time over the Vikings helped propel the Wildcats up the PAC standings and District 1-4A rankings as they ran off the next 10.
The Vikings lost on Sept. 3, then a week later on Sept. 10 in a 2-1 setback to Spring-Ford but have been on their own roll since. Young, a dynamic speedster who was a handful for OJR all night, explained PV came into Thursday’s rematch with a different mentality.
“We were way more confident, we believed in us, I started believing in myself,” Young said. “We all trusted each other and when you have that belief in yourself individually, that’s when it’s easy to play with others who have the same belief in themselves as individuals and I think it really showed tonight.”
After an early feeling out period that saw the teams combine for three corner kicks and two saves by Mecouch, the latter a good one against OJR’s Avery Gies, the tide turned in a blink. PV’s defense won the ball deep in its own end, then flipped the field in a blink with Young out in front making a run toward goal.
Wildcats keeper Devon King came off her line and challenged, but Young had come too far to give up. Recovering the dislodged ball, the sophomore fired in a cross that Marciano re-directed off her head for the opener with 30:14 left in the opening half.
“I don’t give up on those runs, you never know what could happen,” Young said. “I was going to power through it, if I see a gap, I’m going after it.”
Mecouch and defenders Claire Tremba, Brenna Crowe and Brigid Kieffer spent most of the next 30 minutes holding on against an onslaught of pressure. Cies, Audrey Fleck, Leah Royds and Fiona Sanders kept finding their way into the box and put a few dangerous looks on goal, each making PV’s lead feel more and more tenuous.
Mecouch said she had her backs looking for the long balls over the top the Wildcats thrive on, but to also be aware of their crosses and crashing defenders. The senior, who effectively sold out to make a half-block, half-kick save on Sanders with 7:25 left in the first half and added a sprawling save to deny Gies in the second, just seemed to get more locked in with each stop.
Her coaches may have panicked a bit when Mecouch stood content to let a couple early looks drift wide but as they relented on the bench, “she sees something we don’t.”
“It’s a confidence thing, I have to go out and enjoy what I do,” Mecouch said. “I have to believe in myself because otherwise, I’m never going to make the save. I have to trust myself, I’m never going to get there if I don’t.”
Mecouch had to turn away Sanders twice and Gies twice in the first 16 minutes of the second half, so the attack wanted to pick her up. Young and Marciano dealt with some man-marking at times on Thursday, but the sophomore tends to not let that bother her.
She’s a true threat with the ball on her foot and fittingly, both of PV’s second half goals would come off that part of her game. With 18:12 left, Young dropped way back into the midfield to receive a ball from the back then went on a marauding run up the left flank before threading a through ball ahead to Marciano, who finished to grab the brace.
A minute later, it was Young again going at defenders but this time taking it herself. The sophomore had eyes for the back of the net, uncoiling a hissing sidewinder off her left foot that caught the roof of the goal with power.
“I felt confident in myself and my 1-v-1 ability to go at them and either create a chance for myself or create a chance for Gia,” Young said. “I think I’m very good technically and I love to juke people out, that’s just a big part of my game.”
The win vaulted PV to No. 8 in the District 1-4A rankings, while OJR stayed at No. 6 and Spring-Ford finished the night at No. 4. Both the Vikings and Wildcats still have a game to play against the Rams, meaning there’s plenty of intrigue left in sorting out the division before the PAC playoffs begin.
Perk Valley came in hungry on Thursday. Unlike their first meeting with Owen J. Roberts, they got to leave it feeling very full.
“This is massive,” Mecouch said. “Beating a good team like OJR, it keeps us in the hunt for PACs, it gives us some good running for districts, it was just massive for us in terms of the postseason.”
Perkiomen Valley 3, Owen J. Roberts 0
Owen J. Roberts 0 0 – 0
Perkiomen Valley 1 2 – 3
Goals: PV – Giavanna Marciano (Brianna Young), Marciano (Young), Young.
Saves: PV – Anna Mecouch 9; OJR – Devon King 4.
