By Thomas Sellers Jr.
One of the best ways to get ready for a district rivalry showdown is a good old-fashion rivalry showdown.
Before the Millington Lady Trojans headed out to Fayette-Ware for their final regular-season league game, they welcomed the Munford Lady Cougars to Hornet Field. Millington used a pair of goals from Koreena Bedford and Kerie “KeKe” McGhee to prevail 4-1 over the Lady Cougars.
“We tried a little bit different on defense,” Millington Coach William Carter said. “Munford is kind of having a down year, a little bit short of players. So we decided we would try it now before we get back into our district play Thursday. We tried a different defensive look. I liked it and this Munford team is actually pretty fast laterally. They caught us sleeping on one play.”
After trailing 2-0 at the break, Munford used its quickness in the middle of the field to create a scoring opportunity to cut the deficit in half.
Millington made some adjustments to match the movement of the Lady Cougars leading to Bedford and McGhee closing out the goals for the contest late in the second half.
“We did a pretty good job of fighting for the ball and passing the ball,” Carter noted. “I think moving forward from the beginning of the game was to get the ball to the forward and see what Koreena and KeKe could do up top. So that’s what they did and they got two and two that way.”
Millington jumped out 1-0 early in the contest when Bedford nailed a goal from about 12-feet outside of the circle. Bedford has tallied at least one goal in all of the Lady Trojans’ games except one.
Midway through the first half, McGhee blasted a shot into the net to make the score 2-0. Millington watched its halftime lead cut into half before closing out Munford with a pair of late goals.
“Last district match Thursday at Fayette-Ware,” Carter said. “It’s a good rivalry and we’re going to beat them at their place. All of their good players left from last year and they’re our last road block. And we’re going to beat them.
“They’re going to come out swinging and they don’t like us,” he added. “Especially after last year, we know they’re going to come out swinging. Last year they kept talking about the reason why we kept winning was our home field. We’re going to go to their home field and beat them. And we’re going to beat them pretty good.”
Millington won every game against Fayette-Ware last season except for the Regional title game.
The Lady Wildcats snatched the championship from Millington late in that contest.
Carter wants his girls to remember the mission against their league rival.
“I want them to focus on the fact that even if they’re the more physically talented team, I want them to go out and not play down to their level but play up,” Carter concluded.
The Lady Trojans validated Carter’s prediction with a 7-2 victory over Fayette-Ware.
The Lady Trojans clinched the regular season district championship with the win at the Lady Wildcats. Six different players scored goals with Christina Cook connecting twice. Other Millington players to score were McGhee, Bedford, Tess Cook, Lexi Thompson and Kinverlin Mesinos. There were assists from Rilee Ervin to set up those goals.
