Led by junior Maddie Hayden, Apollo couldn’t stop Owensboro Catholic’s high-powered offense and fell 10-0 in the first half.
The Lady Aces took no time getting on the board offensively, with junior Ella Claire Goetz putting them up 1-0 in the third minute.
Minutes later junior Maddie Hayden started off a strong day, making it a 2-0 Owensboro Catholic in the seventh minute of play.
Junior Katie Riney joined in on the action as well, scoring a minute later to make it a 3-0 Lady Aces lead.
Hayden scored her second goal of the day nearly 30 seconds later, followed by a goal from junior Gracie Johnson to make it a 5-0 game in the 10th minute.
From there on it was the Maddie Hayden show, as she scored the next six goals for the Lady Aces to help secure the 11-0 win in the first half.
Hayden finished the day with eight goals, topping Lilly Moore for the single-game record at Owensboro Catholic. This also put Hayden at 40 goals on the season, tying the single-season record for total goals.
Head Coach Andy Hines said they’ve made some adjustments offensively with senior Ashton Logsdon out and it’s opened up a lot of opportunities for Hayden.
“The last couple games we’ve moved some things around,” Hines said. “We moved Ella Claire up because Ashton’s out and Ella Claire is kind of scrappy like Ashton. So Claire kind of creates some opportunities in space [for Maddie]. Then she kind of did her thing.”
Hayden gave all the credit to her teammates, saying that they set up for easy goals time and time again.
“They gave me really good balls,” Hayden said. “They knew where I was going and so they played it off to me and I would put it away. I’m glad to be able to help my team to get back where we want to be.”
Hayden was pleased with their overall play and acknowledged that the team has a district championship and region play on their mind.
“I thought we played well as a team,” Hayden said. “We just wanna get back to the district championship and we want to continue to make it to district.”
The loss wraps up Apollo’s season, leaving them with an overall record of 3-11-1 and finishing 0-7 in district play.
Despite their record not being in their favor, Head Coach Dave Woeste said that they grew a lot over the course of the season.
“We had another good developing year,” Woeste said. “We’ve got a lot of young kids still. I mean a lot of the kids we have are still learning. Very few of them have played a lot of select soccer.”
Woeste said with them only losing four seniors they will have a much more experienced team coming back and can make another leap forward next year.
“We’ve got eight juniors coming in next year and every one of them is decent and I’ve got a couple of freshmen coming in that are gonna be good. Overall, I think we’re going to be an improved team, because we’re not going to have one player that hasn’t played four years under me or hasn’t played four years of soccer.”
Owensboro Catholic on the other hand now has two days off to fine tune some things before they play in the final.
“We’re going to practice the next few days and practice some different options,” Hines said. “Playing a little quicker, especially in the back. I think that’s one of our weaknesses. Just trying to find the ball up higher.”
Hines and company will be in search of back-to-back 9th District Championships, when they take on the winner of Owensboro vs. Daviess County at 5:15 p.m. on Thursday.
