Submitted photo – The Ferndale players and coaches celebrate their tournament win on Saturday.
The Ferndale Wildcats are making a legitimate case to be considered favorites for this year’s Little 4 championship in girls soccer, in what is expected to be a very competitive conference.
And they are doing so at both ends of the field.
On Saturday afternoon, the Wildcats defeated Kelseyville in the championship game of the Upper Lake tournament.
The 2-0 win not only avenged a 3-1 defeat in their season opener — their only loss of the season so far — but it was also Ferndale’s fifth straight shutout.
And that’s not all.
After struggling to find the back of the net in recent seasons, this year’s team has been scoring at a high rate while also keeping opposing attacks in check.
They have outscored their opponents 20-0 during those five games.
Since that opening loss, the Cats have been on fire, beating South Fork (6-0), Mendocino (7-0) and Fort Bragg (4-0) in the lead up to this weekend’s tournament.
They continued to roll on Friday with a statement 1-0 win over fellow Little 4 contender St. Bernard’s in the tournament semifinal.
The Crusaders have also been playing well this season and look better equipped to challenge for the conference pennant this year, while the defending champion Del Norte girls have been every bit as impressive and appear to be playing at a higher level than when they won the league in 2024.
“We always know going into an SB game that it’s gonna be a battle,” Ferndale head coach Bailey Davy said. “They’re a great team that’s had some impressive success the last couple weeks, but in the end today was our day.”
Sisters Macie and Madison Hagemann were once again instrumental in Friday’s win, and both have hit the ground running this season with some big games early in the campaign.
Madison, a freshman, has arguably been the most impressive forward among the conference teams so far and netted her team’s only goal after a well-played through ball from her sophomore sister.
Overall, however, it was far from a clinical performance by either team.
“Honestly, It was a really messy game,” Davy said. “The field was extremely short. We did not handle that well. We were bunched up, we were not connecting passes, we got beat in our midfield more times than we should have, and ultimately it was very close to a totally different outcome at different times.”
No details were immediately available from Saturday’s win, but we’ll have more on that game early next week.
