Cardinal Newman Girls' Soccer is off to a 7-0 start after 2 great games at the University Tournament where they played great soccer, scoring in the 70th minute to put away University, 3-2, to hand the Red Devils their 2nd loss of the season. Newman then faced a 2-1-2 Sacred Heart Cathedral Prep and clean sheeted the Fightin' Irish 2-0 to bring the Cardinals to their 7-0 record.
Newman had a long and tiring road to get to 7-0, starting off with Roseland University Prep and the Cardinals rolled through RUP, clean sheeting them 4-0. The Cardinals kept the clean sheet streak by clean sheeting Petaluma, 3-0, heading into a tough away game against Rancho, but they kept the clean sheet streak up by destroying Rancho 6-0. Newman had another tough game against Marin Academy and after being down at Halftime, 1-0, the Cardinals rolled back with goals from Natalia Belmonte and Abella Hunter to win 2-1 and climb to 4-0. Newman then went on the road to play Ukiah and the Cardinals and Wildcats were tied 0-0 at half, but after a Ukiah penalty goal and 2 Newman goals from Abella Hunter and Sofia Lightner, Newman was able to get a gritty win to climb to 5-0 before the University Tournament.
Head Coach John Gilson on the Week leading up to the Ukiah game:
"Long week. Hard minutes vs Marin Academy. Rested several players. Always interesting when you go to Ukiah. Got out of there with a win."
Newman has had a good women's soccer team over the past few years behind Head Coach John Gilson. They finished 9-6 last year, coming in 3rd in the Oak and losing to Alhambra 4-2 in PKs last year in the NCS D3 Quarterfinals. In 2019, Newman women's soccer finished 17-4-1, winning the Oak and ending a long control of the Oak League by Montgomery. In the NCS D4 Playoffs, the #1 seed Cardinals beat El Molino 7-0 in the 1st Round, beat Head-Royce 4-1 in the Quarterfinals and beat the Cinderella #12 seed Piedmont 5-0 to move onto the Championship against Marin Academy. The Cardinals beat the Wildcats 2-1 in double overtime to win NCS. The Cardinals lost to Ponderosa in the 1st Round of NorCals 6-1 to end their incredible season. In 2018, the Cardinals rolled into playoffs at 11-9 and beat Marin Catholic in the Quarterfinals 2-0, but fell to Branson 1-0 in the semifinals. That wasn't the end of the Cardinals season, as they obtained the 6 seed in the D3 NorCal Championship Playoffs. They were off on their Cinderella journey and beat Center 3-1 in the Quarterfinals, moving on to play Sacred Heart Cathedral Prep. The Cardinals beat Sacred Heart 1-0 and moved on to the NorCal Championship against Bradshaw Christian. The Cardinals handled The Pride 2-1 to take the NorCal Championship.
This 7-0 start is the best 7 game start Newman has had over the past few years and the only year that compares, is 2019, where Newman started out 5-1-1 and eventually went 11-1-1, before losing their first league game to Monty, 3-2. Newman has been building their future up around players from Santa Rosa United and the various club teams around Sonoma County and this year, the Cardinals have a lot of young players with 12 of their players being sophomores or freshmen, a majority of them coming from Santa Rosa United. Newman will face Defending Oak Champs Windsor on January 11th to open League play. Newman seems to have a bright future in women’s soccer.
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