Cloquet Soccer Enters Playoffs On A Roll

Oct 13

Kerry Rodd-NSO

The girls sectional soccer playoffs begin this week. In Section 7A the defending champion, Cloquet, will get the #4 seed and host the #13 seed, Becker, on Thursday at 5pm at Rol Bromberg Field. Tuesday the Lumberjacks tuned up for the playoffs with an 8-2 thrashing of the Duluth Marshall Hilltoppers.

“It was a good confidence builder for us going into the playoffs,” said Cloquet coach Derek Randall. “We feel good, we have some players coming back from injuries like Jessie Ryan, and we got a lot of balls to the net.”

In all Cloquet pounded 25 shots on the Duluth Marshall cage with 8 of those resulting in goals. Cloquet was led by Sadie Micke who picked up four goals, and Emily Rikkola who finished with two goals and an assist.

Micke got Cloquet off to a quick start with a goal in the third minute, but the Hilltoppers evened things nine minutes later. At the 13 minute mark the Jacks got a goal from Rikkola to build a 2-1 lead, but again the Hilltoppers answered at the 17 minute to tie it at 2-2. Rikkola’s second goal of the game came in the 28th minute with Carley Esse assisting and that goal would stand up as the game winner as Cloquet went into halftime up 3-2.

In the second half it took just two minutes for Micke to score, then two minutes later it was a goal by Carri Zeadow, four minutes after that it was Micke again and the Jacks just eight minutes into the second half led it 6-2.

Cloquet ended the scoring with Micke’s fourth goal of the game and an Emily Wangen marker in the 32nd minute of the second half.

“We know that the separation between the top 6 teams in this section is fairly slim,” mentioned Randall. “Any team could step up and win on any given night.”

Kerry Rodd can be reached at kerry@northlandsportsonline.com