McLean varsity girls soccer lost in the first round of playoffs on Monday night. It took 80 minutes and 2 overtimes to decide a winner at Washington- Lee High School War Memorial Stadium.

It was a pretty idle game through the first half while both teams tried to feel out the other. The Generals came out strong in the second half. With building momentum, they continued to penetrate McLean’s back line of Lindsay Blum and Elizabeth Zhou. After a few close calls, the McLean defense tightened up. Although, a long corner caught everybody off guard caught McLean off guard and W-L’s Ava Singh peeled around to back post to was a able to plow through the air ball and shepherded it into the back of McLean’s net.

After that crushing blow, McLean rebounded with a new energy led by substitute Maria McHugo. Not long after, Senior Naomi Jaffe, drove the ball into the middle of the field. At about 30 yards out, she fired a bullet over the W-L goalkeeper. New life sparked into the McLean and a new battle ensued. The end of 80 minutes came quickly and both teams headed back to their benched to prepare for the two 5 minute overtime periods. By this time, a fairly large crowd had gathered on W-L’s side, partly for the boys game that was to follow as well as the building suspense of the present game.

Overtime went by quick while both teams seemed tired and sat back tensely at quite a rang just like two heavyweight boxers sitting back and waiting to strike. The knockout blow came in none other than the last 2 minutes of the second overtime when a cross came in from the far side. A McLean defender on the weak side tried to clear the ball, but instead redirected the ball back into the air and into the middle of the field about 12 yards out from the goal. Then, a few  events happened in a very short succession that will make your head spin. First, The McLean defender collapsed on the ball to prevent a shot on goal. At the same time, two W-L players charged the same same spot where the ball was about to fall. Next, a mix of McLean and W-L players collided into a messy mix of red and white bodies. The ball popped out of the jumble and fell to the foot of W-L’s Kelly Gaudian, who slapped a quick shot into the bottom left corner of the goal and the game was over.

As the commotion cleared, two bodies, one from each team, laid sprawled on turf. Both eventually got attended to and the girls shook hands after what turned out to be a fairly anticlimactic ending and tough loss for the McLean team and its 3 seniors.