Blue Jays drop finale

A bumpy season for the Jamestown High School girls soccer team came to a close at Rotary Field on Thursday night.

Playing host to St. Mary’s, the Saints’ Angie Schumacher put the visiting team up 1-0 just 24 seconds into the match. St. Mary’s went on to send five goals into the net in the first half and defeated Jamestown 6-0.

The Blue Jays finished the year without a victory at 0-14-1 overall, but JHS coach Ryan Kleinknecht was proud of his team for not giving up and improving throughout the season.

“We started out pretty slow, but the team really improved as we went along,” Kleinknecht said. “The last few games they really stepped it up.”

The Blue Jays’ best outing of the season came at home vs. Grand Forks Central, where they scored all four of their goals this season in a 4-4 tie against the Knights. Jamestown had a two-goal lead in that game with 9 minutes left to play.

“We had a little bit of a letdown in that game, but the girls played very well from that point on,” Kleinknecht said. “They saw how their hard work paid off and things starting clicking for them.”

But injuries were something the coach and his team couldn’t control. Jamestown was shorthanded once again in its season finale against St. Mary’s.

“We were down five starters coming into tonight. We kind of played with injuries all season long and never really had our starting lineup in the whole season after the first two weeks,” Kleinknecht said.

Senior Megan Kapp was in goal for the Blue Jays on Thursday, where she turned away 9 St. Mary’s shots on net in the first half and 3 more in the second 40 minutes for 12 saves on the night.

Rachel Power made 4 saves for the Saints, as they improved to 7-3-4 overall and 5-3-2 in the West Region.

Along with Kapp, Jamestown seniors Riley Spenningsby, Molly Witthauer, Carly Nelson and Sasha Seekins played their final match for the Blue Jays.

“We’re going to lose Riley, Molly, Carly, Megan and Sasha, but we had a really young team this year and we’re looking forward to next year,” Kleinknecht said. “We’ll have some good players coming in as freshman and that will be a positive for us.”

St. Mary’s 6, Jamestown 0

St. Mary’s 5 1 — 6

Jamestown 0 0 — 0

First half

Scoring

1, SM, Angie Schumacher (Katie Puetz), 0:24; 2, SM, Puetz, 10:00; 3, SM, Jessica Johnson, 25:00; 4, SM, Taylor Peterson, 36:00; 5, SM, Erin Dohm, 37:00.

Second half

Scoring

6, SM, Puetz (Sydney Miller), 49:00.

Goalkeeper saves: SM, Rachel Power 2-2—4; JHS, Megan Kapp 9-3—12.

Records: St. Mary’s 5-3-2 West Region, 7-3-4 overall; JHS 0-10-0 West Region, 0-14-1 overall.

Sun sports writer Michael Savaloja can be reached at (701) 952-8461 or by email at mikes@jamestownsun.com

Tags: sports, jays, soccer