Freeport girls soccer team withstands late pressure by Burrell

By: Michael Love
Wednesday, September 6, 2023 | 10:14 PM

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The Freeport girls soccer team scored a goal in each half of its Section 2-2A matchup Wednesday evening at rival Burrell.

The second tally, a shot from sophomore Peyton Los from 25 yards out with 26 minutes left in the second half, proved to be the game winner.

Burrell cut a two-goal Freeport lead in half with 10 minutes remaining on a penalty kick from Miley Kariotis and applied a tremendous amount of pressure to get the equalizer, but the Yellowjackets defense held strong in the closing minutes for a dramatic 2-1 victory.

“It was very close at the end, but at the end of the day, our defense really held it together,” Los said.

“(Freeport goalkeeper) Alyssa (Alcorn) made some amazing saves. This was a pretty good win for us. We haven’t won at Burrell in like four years or so. To come out early in the season and win here against a good team, it was really special.”

Freeport remained undefeated, improving to 4-0 overall and 2-0 in section play. The Yellowjackets defeated Deer Lakes in their section opener last week.

Burrell had several chances to tie the game in the final minutes of regulation. Freshman Mikaya Buchak had a point-blank shot from about 12 yards turned away by Alcorn.

Alcorn made a diving save on a redirect off a corner kick at the 7:10 mark, and one final Burrell corner was turned away by the Yellowjackets defense with 4 minutes left.

Burrell finished with 10 corner kicks to Freeport’s zero and had nine shots on goal to Freeport’s six. Alcorn made eight saves.

“We practice a ton of corner kicks, so our defense gets a ton and Alyssa gets a ton,” Freeport coach Joe Treglia said.

“When the chips were down, the defense bailed us out. Burrell put a ton of pressure on us at the end. This is a young team, and they’re learning. It was a good experience, and they’re going to build on it. We’ll come back tomorrow and work on what we need to work on.”

Burrell, playing its first game in nine days since scoring a pair of wins at the season-opening South Park tournament, fell to 2-1 overall.

“I think on those corners, especially in the closing minutes, (Freeport) was a little more desperate than we were,” Burrell coach Frank Nesko said.

“Honestly, I take my hat off to Freeport. They came into a rough environment for them. They played with composure and took advantage of the opportunities they got. We didn’t do that enough, and that was the difference in the game.”

Burrell tipped the field in its favor in the early part of the first half and generated corner kicks and also scoring changes from Buchak, Grace Nesko, Maggie Nesko and McKenna Miller.

Freeport kept the game scoreless until freshman Camryn Woods was able to do her thing.

In the 19th minute, Woods provided Freeport’s second shot on goal as she gained possession in the box to the right of the Burrell goal, rotated into position and fired a shot from about 10 feet.

Burrell junior keeper Dana Barczykowski got a hand on the ball, but it squirted away from her and rolled across the goal line.

The goal was Woods’ ninth of the season.

“This is a great game to learn from,” coach Nesko said.

“We take what we can from this loss and work on getting better in practice. We might have been struggling a little bit in the first half because of the layoff, but we don’t make excuses. In the end, Freeport was better tonight.”

Michael Love is a TribLive reporter covering sports in the Alle-Kiski Valley and the eastern suburbs of Pittsburgh. A Clearfield native and a graduate of Westminster (Pa.), he joined the Trib in 2002 after spending five years at the Clearfield Progress. He can be reached at mlove@triblive.com.

Tags: Burrell, Freeport