The Owatonna girls soccer team has played stellar defense all year long, one of the main reasons why it was crowned co-Big 9 champions this year.
Their impressive defensive play carried on into the section playoffs this week, as after winning at home against Farmington 2-1 Tuesday, the Huskies shut out the Lakeville South Cougars in a section semifinals matchup Thursday. Both teams went scoreless in regulation and in 20 minutes of overtime, but the Huskies won in a shootout to advance to the Section 1AAA championship.
This was the first time the Huskies played in a semifinals game since 2022, as they lost to the Lakeville North Panthers. Owatonna looked to win against the Panthers’ neighbor Cougars to make it to their first section championship game since 2020.
Both teams went scoreless in both the first and second period in the game on Thursday night. They had to go into overtime to settle who was going to advance to the next round of the section playoffs.
Both teams went scoreless in a 10 minute overtime period as well, with the match going into a second overtime period that lasted another 10 minutes.
The score was still tied at 0 after two overtime periods, as the game went into a shootout. Lakeville South went first and their first shot was saved by Owatonna’s senior goalkeeper Anna Mollenhauer.
Owatonna’s first shot was by senior Kennendy Schammel, with it hitting the post and missing. The Cougars’ next shot went in but the Huskies tied the shootout score at one with a goal by senior Averi Vetsch.
The Cougars scored another goal on their third shot to take a 2-1 lead with Owatonna still needing to take their third shot. Senior Abigail Shornock scored to tie with the Cougars once again.
Lakeville South missed their fourth shot as Mollenhauer had her second save of the shootout period and her 12th total save of the game. This allowed for Owatonna to have a great opportunity to force the Cougars to a must-make fifth shot, and they did just that as junior Attley Klemmensen scored on the Huskies’ fourth shot.
With the game coming down to potentially one shot, the Cougars missed their fifth shot of the shootout period, with the Huskies winning the thriller and advancing to the Section 1AAA championship.
Lakeville North won over New Prague on Thursday night, as the Huskies will face the Panthers in the section championship in Lakeville on Tuesday night at 7:00 p.m. The last time the Huskies and the Panthers saw each other in the playoffs was in 2022, with the Panthers beating Owatonna 2-0 in the section semifinals.
Local News
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