By TOMMY REZAC
St. Joseph Post
FAUCETT - Mid-Buchanan girls' soccer opened its home schedule on Monday with a 5-0 win over East Kansas City - the first match played on their home pitch that's now outfitted with brand new turf.
As nice as that win was, and as nice as the turf looks, the Dragons were hoping to fix a few things and be more confident in their approach on Tuesday.
Mission accomplished.
The Dragons (4-0) scored four goals in the first 6.5 minutes and flat out dominated Ewing Marion Kaufmann in an 8-0 victory.
Mid-Buchanan managed 15 shots-on-goal, and kept the ball in and around Kaufmann's 18-yard box all day long.
"We were overthinking too much," junior striker Emily Parrott said of Monday's match. "It made us slip up a little bit and we were getting frustrated with ourselves. But, today we worked more as a team, and I'm proud of that."
Senior Jordan Thornton got things going immediately, scoring the game's first goal unassisted in just 20 seconds. Three minutes later, Thornton hit another short-range goal off of a pass from Taiylor Harrington.
The onslaught didn't stop there. Freshman Danika Black hit a long shot from roughly 20 yards away that went off the goalie's hands and in, making it 3-0 Mid-Buchanan with 34:28 left in the first half.
Exactly 59 seconds later, another freshman got in on the fun. Avani Kendzora poked a ball past the goal line off of a corner kick from Black.
4-0 Dragons within the first 5:32 of the match.
"Coming in hard and scoring those first four goals in the first however many minutes really got our engines going," Parrott commented.
Mid-Buchanan was awarded seven total corner kicks in Tuesday's match. On one of those tries, Black kicked the ball into the middle of the box, where sophomore London Wilson was able to kick it hard through traffic and past the goalie's hand for a tough goal with 19:54 left until halftime. The Dragons now led 4-0.
Parrott, who assisted on a pair of goals herself, got one for her own on a long, 20-plus yard shot that sailed across the pitch and into the top of the net, putting the Dragons up 6-0 with 18:06 left until half.
Later on, the Dragons scored on another corner kick opportunity. After some jostling in the box following the kick, Parrott and junior Kaitlyn Mejia seemingly scored a goal together when the ball bounced off of each of their cleats and past the line.
Mejia was officially credited, and the Dragons went up 7-0 with 9:46 left in the first half. The Dragons had some chances to end the match via mercy rule late in the first half, but they'd do so, almost right away, in the second.
Parrott hit another fairly long shot, this one from 15 yards and straight ahead, to make it 8-0 and end the match in mercy rule with still 38:05 on the clock in the second half.
In all, six Dragons scored, and Mid-Buchanan held Marion Kaufmann without a single shot-on-goal. Heck, the Dragons had just one goal kick through the entire match.
"Today, we tried to focus on playing simple," head coach Danielle Burkart-Beers said. "Making smart passes and when we can do that, great things can happen and that's really what our focus was on today."
Mid-Buchanan, who has outscored their opposition so far this season a combined 20-1, are off to a 4-0 start - fresh off of their Final Four appearance last year.
"Coming out with four wins in a row is really nice to have," Parrott said, "especially since we gained so many freshmen this year and we lost so many seniors. So, I think they've filled the shoes of the seniors so far."
The Dragons have strength in numbers. While they graduated seven seniors from last year's squad, there are 16 new freshmen on varsity and JV combined.
Combine that with a corps of 8-9 returners who have significant varsity minutes under their belt, that's a decent formula for success.
In just the third season of this program's existence, Burkart-Beers is seeing continued growth and evolution within a Mid-Buchanan team that's no longer full of novice players.
"It's exciting to see them and hear them talking at school, 'I'm playing soccer and I'm doing this,'" Burkart-Beers said. "So, just growing the sport and seeing they're willing to come out and just give it a shot. That means we're doing something right out here. We're providing an environment that's fun and they want to be out here."
Mid-Buchanan will now head to St. Louis this weekend to face defending Class 3 state champion MICDS on Friday. They'll then face Ursuline on Saturday - a team that finished first in 2021 and fourth in Class 3 just last year.
"We have some really great competition coming up this weekend," Burkart-Beers noted. "We're excited to test ourselves and see where we're at with that. So, continuous growth throughout the year and I think it's going to come together."
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