Lady Hounds advance in 2A substate

FORT MADISON - The final home match of the season for the Fort Madison girls soccer team ended with the celebration of milestones from two of the top players in program history.
The Bloodhounds’ 8-1 win over Keokuk in Thursday’s Class 2A Region 4 quarterfinal at the Baxter Sports Complex was a chance to honor the numbers put up by Hadley Wolfe and Halle Menke throughout their careers, and both played big roles in the win.
Wolfe scored four goals and had an assist, while Menke had three assists, as the 15th-ranked Bloodhounds (13-2-1) advanced to next Tuesday’s semifinal at 13th-ranked Burlington (14-2-1).
The two were then honored after the match — Wolfe for reaching the 100-goal mark for her career, and Menke for reaching the 50th assist for her career.
“We’ve never had a 100-goal scorer in program history, and I’d have to look it up but I don’t think we’ve had anyone reach 50 assists,” coach Carrie Burken said. “Those are such big numbers. I think it shows just how much they’ve contributed since they were freshmen. They have meant so much to the team.”
Wolfe had all three of Fort Madison’s first-half goals, a half in which the Bloodhounds looked sluggish at times.
“I think we started out slow because we hadn’t played in almost a week,” Burken said. “Even against Iowa City West (an 8-0 loss last Friday), that was a completely different game situation because we were on defense the whole time.
“I just asked them at halftime if we were playing the best we could, and the answer was ‘No.’ I asked them to play up to their potential, asked them to make quicker decisions, move the ball the way I knew they can. And we did that the second half.”
“I’d say we weren’t making good passes or smart decisions,” Menke said. “I had some balls that were just way too long. Just not good passing.”
“I think we played well, but we didn’t play our best game,” Wolfe said. “We started out slow. I think the water breaks (one midway through each half) kind of took away our momentum, but we battled through it.”

The Bloodhounds then got two goals in the first five minutes of the second half — Kara Lake scored with 36:17 remaining, then Emma Snaadt scored a minute later.
Keokuk (5-13) got its lone goal of the game with 16:24 to play when Darby Tackes’ shot got in at the upper part of the net.
Wolfe scored her final goal with 6:39 left, then Molly Schulte and Snaadt scored for the final margin.
“We were better in the second half,” said Wolfe, who leads Class 2A with 41 goals this season. “We were able to connect on passes, and just slowed everything down and made plays.”
“I think we were making good runs, connecting passes,” said Menke, who has 20 assists this season to lead Class 2A. “I think that was big.”
Lake, Snaadt and Turnbull each had an assist. 
Now the Bloodhounds face their Southeast Conference rival in what has become a postseason trend — the two teams have met in the regional semifinal four times in the previous five seasons, with each team winning twice.
Burlington has won six of the last eight matchups in the series, although the two teams battled to a 2-2 tie on May 4.
“I think we learned we can beat them,” Burken said. “We had the lead on them in the last game until about 10 minutes to go. So I think we learned we can play with them. It convinced me we can beat them.”
“I think we have to make passes, find gaps in their defense, make them pick and choose who they’re going to defend,” Menke said. “I learned some things the last time we played them.”
“We’re definitely going to have to be on our A-game,” Wolfe said. “We just have to keep possession for as long as we can and take advantage of our opportunities.”