BANGOR, Maine — The Camden Hills High School girls soccer team put an exclamation point on its impressive start in its first season in Eastern Maine Class A on Tuesday night.
The Windjammers received a pair of goals from senior striker Emma Gutheinz and a goal and two assists from junior midfielder Charlotte Messer to stun Bangor 4-1 in a battle of unbeatens.
Former Class B power Camden Hills improved to 7-0 while Bangor, with four Eastern Maine A titles and a state crown in the past five seasons, fell to 6-1.
Sarah Bragg staked Bangor to a 1-0 lead just 1:52 into the game, but the Windjammers’ Gutheinz responded just 3:01 later and junior striker Bryn Anderson scored what proved to be the game-winner with 31.7 seconds left in the half.
The opportunistic Windjammers capitalized on two Bangor miscues to make it 4-1 on goals 5:16 apart by Gutheinz and Messer early in the second half and withstood a furious Bangor rally thanks to the goalkeeping of Dutch exchange student Jana Speiker.
Speiker finished with 11 saves, including eight in the second half, on 25 shots at goal.
The insurance goals came after Camden Hills sophomore defender Claire Pierce had cleared the potential game-tying goal off the line with Speiker out of position after suffering a minor neck injury during a wild scramble.
Bragg was just six yards out but the alert Pierce got her legs on the shot and it was eventually cleared.
“Coach [Meredith Messer] always tells us to circle around and cover the goal mouth if Jana comes out,” said Pierce.
Spieker came off the field briefly after being attended to but returned 1:29 later.
Camden Hills made it 3-1 three minutes later when Messer’s long ball found Gutheinz, who split two Ram defenders.
“It went off my thigh and I thought the ‘keeper [Emily Gilmore] was going to get it. I followed the ball, she got a hand on it and bounced off her to me,” said Gutheinz, who tapped the ball into the empty net.
Shortly afterward, Gilmore came racing out of the penalty area to clear a ball only to kick it to the middle of the field where it found Messer.
“It went right to my foot and I had an open net,” said Messer, whose 27-yard shot evaded Gilmore, who had scampered back to try to get into position.
After a first half in which the speedy and highly skilled Windjammers had a slight edge in play, the desperate Rams, led by the dashing runs and crosses of Maddi Cormier, kept the Windjammers under siege.
But Spieker came up with a number of superb saves, including a point-blank gem off Luci Clein, to thwart the Rams.
“We had so many chances. I don’t know how they didn’t go in. Their goalie was real good,” said Cormier.
Bragg opened the scoring by roofing a rebound after Spieker stopped Erynne Sauda’s point-blank header.
An unmarked Gutheinz equalized with a glancing header off an Eliza Roy corner.
“I was hoping to flick it to someone else but it went in,” said Gutheinz, the school’s all-time leading scorer.
Anderson scored off a Messer feed after Messer was able to avoid a slide tackle at the top of the penalty area. Anderson ran freely down the left side and put a 12-yard shot inside the far post.
“I just tried to shoot it as fast as I could,” said Anderson.
Gilmore made nine saves on 26 shots.
JV: Bangor 4-0