The Baylor High School girls soccer team defeated Chattanooga Christian School 8-1 in their first ever Division II Class AA meeting on Thursday night.
Freshman Clair Holtzclaw opened the scoring for Baylor in 16’ when she poked the ball
home from a corner kick. Just two minutes later the CCS goal keeper fumbled an in swinging
free kick and freshman Aliya Cooper was alert and tapped in the rebound.
The Chargers would answer in the 24th minute when freshman Savannah Jones found a pocket of
space and scored from outside the 18-yard box.
The Lady Red Raiders responded immediately after in the 25th minute. Sophomore Melissa
Oliveira dribbled through a couple of players, got a lucky deflection and clinically found the
back of the net to restore Baylor’s two goal lead.
Baylor would add a fourth first half goal in the 28th minute as Cooper sent in a low cross that was
tapped in by senior Lea Hunter.
The Lady Red Raiders came roaring out of the gate to start to second half, scoring three
goals in six minutes. Oliveira blasted her shot past the CCS goal keeper to score her second of
the match, Baylor’s fifth.
The Cooper-Hunter combination linked up again in the 44th minute. Cooper put the ball on a gold
platter for Hunter to score her second from close in.
Three minutes later, Oliveira slipped a pass through to Cooper who beat her defender for
pace and scored Baylor’s sixth.
The night couldn’t have gotten any worse for the Chargers, but then it did. The CCS
bench was shown a red card and an assistant coach had to leave the sideline.
“Its hard to rise back mentally when you go down like that,” Chattanooga Christian Head
Coach Gretchen Hammel. “But I think this team has so much potential.”
Baylor scored their eighth and final goal in the 62th minute when freshman Baker Young took a
free kick near the sideline. Her curling effort kissed the post on the way in to put an exclamation
point on The Lady Red Raider’s first region game.
Baylor finished with 16 shots with 12 of them on target, while CCS managed 10 shots
including 7 on target.
“We have been working on trying to play a lot quicker in the final third and I think you
got to see that today,” Baylor Head Coach Curtis Blair said. “It is a great result at home and we
need to continue to build off of this moving forward.”
Baylor will meet former region rival Harpeth Hall at a neutral site in Murfreesboro on
Monday at Richard Siegel Soccer Complex at 4:30 p.m.
Coach Blair explained why The Lady Red Raiders were playing a former region foe at a
neutral site. “We have had some really good games in the past and because of our region change
we still want to continue some of that tradition of playing those good Nashville teams.”
CCS will host the Chattanooga Patriots Tuesday at 7 p.m.