HOWELL — Hartland's gritty defense helped propel them to the district final, but it was the team's opponent Thursday — Okemos — that was impregnable, holding the Eagles to four shots and shutting them out 3-0.
Hartland head coach Andrew Kartsounes said the Eagles battled but were sluggish, playing for the third night in a row against a top-tier Okemos team that's now 20-1-4 on the season and moves onto regionals next week.
"I think that was the story of the entire game — we just didn't execute well," Kartsounes said. "We had the harder game yesterday, and coming off three games in a row it was a hard to keep going. They had that goal right at the end of the first half which added to our uncharacteristic mistakes."
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That goal extended the Chieftain's lead to 2-0 after a mistimed jump on a free kick left Hartland goal keeper Julie DeBus helpless as Okemos captain Sarah Kovan scored easily with less than a minute to play in the first half. Freshman Aston Miller added a beautiful goal off a penalty kick that rang off the inside post to the left of the goal in the second half that essentially put the game out of reach.
"The goal at the end of the first half was a bit of a back-breaker," said Hartland senior captain Hailey Pleshakov, who missed a penalty kick in the first half. "But we still had another half to play, we worked our tails off but came up just short."
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The loss ends what otherwise was a successful season where the Eagles (14-3-3) defeated Brighton for the first time in girls soccer history while only allowing 11 goals in 20 games. The number of wins also were the most in Kartsounes' tenure as coach of either the girls or boys soccer teams.
"With the records that we have broken from goals allowed, wins and shutouts in a season, the program has taken that step forward to where we can compete with any team in the state," he said.
Kartsounes also said he believes that the future of Hartland soccer is bright.
"We are graduating a good class, but we still have a lot of returning players (17 returning)," he said. "Three out of four defenders, if you include the goalie, are sophomores. When you have a defense that is this good and you return three out of four it usually speaks well for what you can build off for the future."
As the season ends for the Eagles, so does the career for Pleshakov, who will be playing next year for Miami (Ohio) University.
"I'd say this has been a successful year, both basketball and soccer teams I have been on have set a lot of records. I had a great time," said Pleshakov. "My next step is college. I will start to train all summer and then go to school."
