The Cedarcrest Red Wolves defeated the Mount Si Wildcats 2-1 in a very spirited, sometimes physical battle in KingCo 3A girls’ varsity soccer action last Tuesday night at Mount Si High School.

Cedarcrest remained undefeated with the win, while the Wildcats fell to 0-2 in conference.

Wildcat coach Bruce Caldwell praised both teams for their effort.

“I thought Cedarcrest played really well. Mount Si played really well, I think they [the Red Wolves] had more luck than we had, that’s all,” he said.

Luck, indeed, was not on Mount Si’s side. During the course of the match the Wildcats narrowly lost five chances to score – a couple just missed the net, a couple of others were stopped by Cedarcrest’s goalie, and one missed off the crossbar.

“We had a lot of opportunities and they just didn’t go in,” Caldwell said.

The Red Wolves’ Missy Adams opened the scoring after both teams started out playing defensive soccer. Adams’ goal came in the 19th minute off a rebound of a shot that had been stopped by Wildcat goalie Caitlin Braun.

Cedarcrest scored again just as stoppage time started in the first half in the 38th minute, as Jamie Coe took a nice pass from teammate Kim Drew and sent the ball past Braun into the net for the 2-0 lead.

Mount Si struck quickly in the second half, as Sara Mellon took a pass from teammate Kristen Berndt and sent it past the Cedarcrest keeper to cut the deficit in half.

Despite a furious effort to tie, the Wildcats could get no closer. Kristen Travis, who replaced Braun as goalkeeper for the second half, did her part to keep the Wildcats in it, making a couple of huge stops late, but the offense was unable to capitalize.

“Cedarcrest is tough. You can’t take it away from them, they did a good job,” said Caldwell.