MILWAUKEE -- The Alverno College women's soccer team battled through yet another game with no extra bodies on the bench for relief, but was still able to put together a stellar effort on the field with a 4-1 nonconference victory over North Central University (Minn.) at home.
Senior forward Ellie LaFond (Waukesha, Wis./West) was a major reason for the Inferno's success, netting three goals to become Alverno's all-time points leader with 82 points while also tying the all-time mark for goals with 39. Alex Salisbury, who graduated in 2007, was the former leader in points (81) and is tied with LaFond for leader in goals.
"It's exciting," said LaFond of her record-breaking effort. "I didn't know I was close to breaking any records. This is the most talent we've ever had on a team, and it's made me want to push myself even harder this year."
LaFond wasted no time getting the Inferno (2-0 overall) on the board, knocking in her first goal just under seven minutes into the game. North Central answered back with its only goal at the 25:31 mark, but the Inferno quickly squashed any of the Rams' hopes of a win as LaFond knocked in her next two goals in quick succession.
"I was impressed with Ellie's scoring and the way she took charge with it being her first game back with the team this season," said Alverno head coach Brittany Oliveira. "I thought we played extremely hard, and I thought the effort and intensity that we were able to play with, considering that again we had no subs, was really impressive."
Freshman forward Kelsey Kochanowski (Oak Creek, Wis.) tallied the fourth and final goal for the Inferno in the 84th minute, despite the fact that the squad's energy had begun to lag in the fading heat of the day.
"It's a challenge to play 90 minutes and every single one of them had to," Oliveira said. "Now they've done that two games back-to-back and that's taxing. It's hard on the body and hard on the mind and I'm impressed that they pushed through so hard. We continued to fight and were even able to get another goal in the second half."
Oliveira was also impressed by the effort of her defensive players, including seniors Joslyn Binkowski (Greenfield, Wis.) and Alex Brenner (West Allis, Wis./Nathan Hale), freshman Marissa Christjohn (Milwaukee, Wis./Thomas More) and junior Kelly Sunstrom (Muskego, Wis./Martin Luther).
"I thought we did a good job on the defensive side of not allowing them free chances," Oliveira said. "We were able to get in front and block a lot of balls. Joslyn and Marissa played strong and did a good job of covering a lot of ground and Kelly was a beast on the outside just tackling. Alex also played really well and covered a ton of ground at midfield for us."
Senior goalkeeper Jackie Barnes (Germantown, Wis.) was solid between the posts for 90 minutes, allowing just the one goal and racking up 11 saves.
Alverno will look to string three wins together for the first time since the beginning of its season in 2007 as they travel to take on Northland International University tomorrow.
Although the Inferno will be going on short rest with games on consecutive days with no rest minutes, Oliveira and LaFond are both looking for the team to dig in mentally and physically.
"I told them to get lots of rest and be ready to put forth this same kind of effort tomorrow," Oliveira said. "It's going to be hard physically with it being our third game this week on back-to-back days, but they have to mentally push through and be ready to go one more time tomorrow and then we'll have some time to rest."
LaFond also sees that inner toughness in her team, and feels that playing together tired has helped their team chemistry.
"It was great to see everyone stick together today even though we were really tired," LaFond said. "I think we're really starting to gel. We just have to dig deep even though we have less than 24 hours before our next game. We need to try to get some rest and come back physically and mentally ready to go again."
Game time with Northland is set for 12 p.m. in Dunbar, Wis.
