Highland Tarnishes Golden Rule

Quartz Hill High is not ready to stroll through the Golden League, at least not yet.

Highland proved that the Rebels are vulnerable, using tight defense and motivation from Quartz Hill’s domination of the league to earn a 0-0 tie on Tuesday night in Quartz Hill.

“All the newspapers pump up Quartz Hill,” said Coach Lemuel Galvao of Highland. “They get a lot of press and we don’t get anything.

“They underestimated Highland. We’re never in the paper. People don’t read about us, so they don’t know about us and they don’t come ready to play us.”

Quartz Hill (12-1-1, 3-0-1 in league play) trying to win its third consecutive league title and sixth in eight years, played without Kelli Cox, the Golden League’s most valuable player last season, and seemed to be off balance offensively without her.

“She’s a goal scorer and a finisher,” Coach Maury Cauchon of Quartz Hill said Cox, who has 15 goals in 12 games, but missed the game because of an ankle injury. “She would have added another dimension to our attack. She would have definitely helped.”

Quartz Hill dominated the first half, outshooting Highland, 13-0, and not allowing Highland into its goalbox until there were 23 seconds left in the half.

That’s when Lizelle Jackson’s soft header rolled into the box and was picked up by Quartz Hill’s goalkeeper.

“We played great defense,” Galvao said. “I teach my girls to be patient and we shut them down.”

Highland (7-6-3, 3-0-1) never really shut them down in the first half, but forced them to take low percentage shots, none that had any chance to score.

Six of Quartz Hill’s shots sailed wide, two went over the crossbar, another three were blocked by defenders and the remaining two managed to reach goalkeeper Meghan Stewart of Highland, but had no chance of scoring.

“We just didn’t get the ball in the net,” Cauchon said. “We usually put one out of three chances away, but we didn’t do that [this time].”

Quartz Hill’s best opportunity to score came from midfielder Lindsay Giampetro of Highland.

During injury time, midfielder Stephanie Sheldrick of Quartz Hill ripped a shot from 20 yards that Giampetro tried to head out of danger, but the ball skipped off the back of her head and hit the crossbar before being cleared out of danger by a Highland defender.

“I thought it was going in,” Giampetro said. “I just dropped to the ground and said, ‘Thank God.’ I thought I had it, but it skipped off the back of my head.”

Highland’s offense came close to materializing in the second half, but was smothered by defender Jennifer True of Quartz Hill.

Highland’s best opportunity came in the 70th minute when Jackson, from the top of the 18-yard box, passed the ball to Alexis Garcia, who had a one-on-one with the keeper but was offside.

“We are just one or two passes away from going on the offensive,” said Galvao, whose team has lost four games by one goal. “We made good passes and then we would pass the ball out of bounds. We kept missing that last pass. Impatience gets us. A couple of times there were too many passes.”

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Hart High needed a goal in the 70th minute to defeat Foothill League rival Saugus in a girls’ soccer game, 1-0. D12