The Los Lunas Tigers advanced to the second round of the Fuddruckers Girls State Soccer Tournament on Friday afternoon with a 1-0 win over the visiting Lovington Wildcats.
LLHS improved to 12-9 on the season with the win, and moved on to take on the No. 3 seed Hope Christian Huskies on Wednesday afternoon.
It was a tightly contested match throughout, as there was very little to separate the two sides from each other.
Early in the second half, the Tigers were able to break through off of a corner kick.
The Wildcats had a chance to clear, but couldn’t get the ball out and LLHS forward Emma Ingram got a foot to it and put the ball into the top of the net for what would prove to be the only goal of the match.
Lovington had a number of chances to tie things up, and even had the LLHS goalkeeper beat on a couple of occasions before the defense recovered to keep them off the board.
With the win, the Tigers took on No. 2 seed Hope Christian yesterday afternoon at the Bernalillo Soccer Complex.
A recap of that game is available on the News-Bulletin website.
The Huskies were 17-3 in the regular season and won their district. The winner of that game will play the winner of the match between No. 3 seed Albuquerque Academy and No. 6 seed Grants this afternoon at 2 p.m.
The Los Lunas boys, the only other Valencia County team to advance to the state playoffs, had a bye in the first round due to being a top four seed.
The Tigers played their first game on Wednesday against Chaparral at the Bernalillo Soccer Complex.
Chaparral, the five seed in the tournament, beat Highland High School last Friday to advance to the second round and earn a matchup with Los Lunas, the four seed.
The winner of that matchup will play the winner of the match between No. 1 overall seed Academy and No. 8 Lovington today at 10 a.m in the semi-finals.
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September 21, 2023
