By Eric Lusk
Sports Editor
elusk@elkintribune.com

You couldn’t have scripted a much better week for Elkin High’s girls soccer program.

The Lady Elks learned Monday they had been ranked the No. 1 team in the state for Class 1A — the first time in school history the girls have risen that high in the weekly coaches poll.

The next two nights, Elkin proved on the field it deserved the lofty distinction, beating a pair of ranked opponents who finished ahead of them in last year’s conference standings.

Joe McCulloch’s pink-jerseyed squad followed up its emotional double overtime win over No. 13 South Stokes on Tuesday by beating — and dominating at times — perennial power Bishop McGuinness by a 4-2 score on Wednesday.

Elkin gave up a goal to the No. 12 Villains in the first five minutes, their legs maybe a little slow to get going after playing for 100 minutes the night before. But once the Elks found their rhythm midway through the first half, the game turned decidedly one-sided in favor of the recently crowned top-ranked team in the state.

Sophomore Madison Spagnoletti, who wore her zeal to play well in Wednesday’s game on her sleeve, scored three goals to lead the offense. Freshman Mary Tayloe added the other goal, helping push Elkin to 9-0-0 overall and 4-0-0 in the Northwest 1A Conference.

Bishop, which was edged by South Stokes in last year’s conference title race, dropped to 2-4-1. South Stokes is 5-2-1.

“The girls in school today seemed mentally focused,” Coach McCulloch said after Wednesday’s contest. “Their bodies might have said no, but they were excited and wanting to play.”

McCulloch said he was genuinely concerned after Bishop’s quick score that his team might have been spent emotionally and physically coming off the double OT triumph from the night before.

But the Villains’ goal only seemed to enliven the Elks rather than deflate them.

Hannah Bertke led the charge in the midfield as Elkin started finding its rhythm. Spagnoletti was visibly flustered at not getting a lot of touches early but that changed as the team learned how to attack Bishop’s deep-sweeper defense.

Tayloe ultimately broke the ice with just under 13 minutes to play in the half. A ball lofted through the Bishop defense, and Tayloe beat the Villains’ keeper to the spot where it was going to land, flicking the ball into the net before her opponent could arrive to challenge. The ball seemed to float in the air for several seconds, like in slow motion, before landing in the back of the net.

“I tell them if we get down a goal, you’ve got to use your mental focus,” McCulloch said. “If you get down two goals, you’ve still got to come back. I’m proud of them, fatigue-wise and mental-focus wise, even a goal down they were able to come back tonight.”

Elkin grabbed a 2-1 lead with less than two minutes to play before halftime. Tayloe passed a ball up to Spagnoletti, and the all-conference forward slipped a roller past the keeper.

A focus on conditioning in the off-season continues to reap dividends for the Elks. McCulloch’s players seemed a step quicker in the second half and started winning a lot more 50-50 balls.

Spagnoletti nearly scored four minutes after intermission, but that shot was scooped up. She did find the back of the net again about two minutes later. Senior Kali Brooks, who had earned a hat trick the night before to beat South Stokes, got loose on a breakaway into the heart of the Bishop defense. Spagnoletti called for the ball, got a great pass and was money on her shot from the right side, beating a defender and the goalie for a 3-1 lead.

Spagnoletti picked up her hat trick with 26 minutes to play, getting the ball in the middle of the field, turning and firing before anyone could challenge her.

Dubbed “Thunder and Lightning” earlier in the week, Brooks and Spagnoletti became the Hat Trick Sisters by each scoring three goals on back to back nights against their chief conference rivals.

“We work really well together,” said Brooks, who was a freshman when Elkin restarted its girls soccer program in 2006. “We have a strong chemistry. Madison and I can just read each other and we know where each other is going to be.”

That seems to be the Elks M.O. more and more as a team. There were several standouts in Wednesday’s game.

Tayloe gave the Elks another genuine offensive threat, keeping Bishop from loading up its defense against Brooks and/or Spagnoletti. Diana McCulloch and Gladys Hernandez had some booming kicks on the defensive end to thwart Bishop attacks.

Players like Lily Woodward and Rebekah Howard played well in unsung roles, breaking up Bishop’s rhythm. Bertke nearly scored a couple of times, at one point firing a rocket in the second half that sailed just over the goal.

Bishop scored its second goal with 20 minutes to play, knocking in a rebound from about 20 yards away. But the Elks successfully defended their net the rest of the night. Hannah Gilmore and Rhiannon Childress split goal-minding duties for Elkin, each giving up one score but each also making some nice saves.

Despite this being Elkin’s first girls soccer win over Bishop in school history, players didn’t go overboard with celebrations after the final whistle. In fact, many were eager to get off the field and into the whirlpool, knowing that yet another game loomed Thursday against West Stokes, less than 24 hours away.

But the Elks’ fantastic week ended with a bit of a blessing — Thursday’s rains washed out the rematch with the 2A Wildcats, giving the team a reprieve from another quick turnaround game against a talented opponent.

And maybe a little chance to savor just what they’ve accomplished so far this season — No. 1 state ranking, conference lead, history-making wins, bringing more awareness to the fight against breast cancer by wearing pink jerseys for home games.

Older players like Brooks can appreciate just how far the program has come since the sport was reborn for girls in the spring of ‘06.

“When we started out my freshman year, we were really young,” Brooks said. “We won three games. But as each year has gone on, we’ve played more together as a team. We’ve come closer together. We know and trust each other.”

Fittingly, Spagnoletti finished Brooks’ thought on that subject, just like she finished off a Brooks pass earlier in the game for a goal.

“We’re a family now,” she added. “We’re very close.”