Photos by Ray Hamill/Humb oldtSports.com – Action from Saturday’s game between the Cubs and Cats at Ferndale.
The Arcata girls clinched the Big 4 championship in girls soccer with a game to spare over the weekend.
The Tigers hosted McKinleyville and won 2-0, which was their sixth straight win in conference action.
That lifted the Arcata girls to 6-1-1 (19 points) with one game remaining, and with second-placed Fortuna falling 3-0 to Eureka, that means the Tigers cannot be caught.
Also in action over the weekend, in the Little 4 girls conference, St. Bernard’s and Del Norte tied 0-0 while champions Ferndale continued to roll with a 7-1 win over South Fork, with a particularly memorable game for one of their senior stars.
In boys action on Saturday, Fortuna defeated Eureka 1-0, McKinleyville beat South Fork 7-0 and Del Norte beat St. Bernard’s 17-0.
Kaden Lodes scored the only goal of the game for the Huskies, who moved within one point of Arcata in the standings as they get set for a championship showdown against the Tigers at Fortuna on Wednesday night .
Fortuna head coach Daniel Holmes also praised the play of his back line — Humberto Lopez, Joe Eberle, Brandon Cruz and Brandon Castillo — which helped secure the shutout.
“Fortuna capitalized on an early opportunity and unfortunately we just couldn’t find the back of the net,” Eureka head coach Tommy Learmouth said.
Eureka’s Mason Beauchamp continued his impressive year in goal and had another strong performance while keeping a dangerous Fortuna attack to a single goal for just the second time in league play.
The Eureka defense of Kyan Green, Luiz Gonzalez, Grayden Larson and Jerome Everta had “their best showing of the season,” according to their coach.
“I thought our offense gave Fortuna a lot of problems, but today just wasn’t our day,” Learmouth added.
The Ferndale girls, meanwhile, just continue to roll as they stretched their unbeaten run to 17 straight games, 16 of which they have won.
The highlight of the game for the Cats was Michaela Ellsmore’s first-ever high school goal in her final-ever regular-season home game.
Ellsmore, who has been one of her team’s best defenders for the past few seasons, rarely goes forward even for set pieces, but she did so for a corner kick in Saturday’s game and launched a long range shot into the top left corner of the goal.
“From teammates to coaches to parents and spectators, everyone was out of their seats and on their feet cheering for her,” Ferndale head coach Bailey Davy said.
Ellsmore’s goal put the Cats up 3-0 at halftime, and they would add four more goals after the break.
Madison Gossi and Teresa Catana each netted twice in the win, while impressive sisters Macie and Madison Hagemann each also scored for the high-flying Cats.
Macie’s goal came on a free kick from around 30 yards out.
Madison also had two assists, while Macie set up Ellsmore’s goal with her corner kick.
Sisters Abigail and Madison Gossi each also had an assist, as did impressive freshman Arlene Glines.
“The girls played really well,” Davy said. “They moved the ball around especially well in the midfield.
“We’ve been working in a few specific areas recently at practice, and they were able to successfully implement them into (Saturday’s) game, which was fun to watch.”
Abigail Gossi and Macie Hagemann were particularly effective.
The Cats will close out their conference schedule at Del Norte on Tuesday.
