Inside the Huddle

A few newsworthy items won’t be in the Central Kitsap Reporter print edition when it comes out Friday.
Most notably: Olympic and Klahowya played a great girls soccer game Tuesday at Silverdale Stadium, ending in a 0-0 tie. Neither team created many scoring opportunities, but the Lady Eagles managed a few shots on goal against Oly goalkeeper Darrien Dorr, who registered her fifth consecutive shutout.
The tie was significant for more reasons than one.
On the lighter side, there is a friendly rivalry between KSS coach Troy Oelschlager and Oly coach Steve Haggerty. Oelschlager played under Haggerty at Olympic, but the KSS coach is winless against his mentor since taking over at KSS. Oelschlager does own a state title, however, whereas Haggerty doesn’t. You be the judge.
But more importantly, the game had significant implications on the combined Class 3A/2A Olympic League standings and playoff race. Both teams were undefeated in league play entering the game, with KSS controlling its own destiny for the 2A crown and Oly controlling its own destiny for the 3A crown.
The Lady Eagles are now 7-0-2 overall and 5-0-2 in league, comfortably ahead of second-place Kingston (3-3-2, 3-2-1) in the 2A race. Oly (6-2-2, 4-0-2), however, is in a dogfight with North Kitsap (6-1-2, 5-0-1) in the 3A race. The tie dropped Oly two points behind NK, which beat North Mason Tuesday.
NK and KSS play today in a game that will go a long way toward determining the eventual league champion(s).
Here are some post-game quotes from Dorr:
On the importance of the game — “We were looking at this as one of our biggest games of the season because Klahowya is really good this year.”
On registering her fifth consecutive shutout: “I feel really comfortable this year with my defense … most of my shutouts are due to my defense.”
Haggerty:
On the flow of the game — “I thought we started fairly flat … we didn’t create our first quality chance until there were 13 minutes left in the ball game.”
On the scoreless effort on offense — “I don’t think we executed very well, we didn’t move the ball well enough to get the ball in the box so we could follow our chances.”
On the implications of the tie — “It’s not the end of the world, but we’ve got our work cut out for us.”
And Oelschlager:
On his team’s effort — “The girls were up, they know we’ve never beat them. They played with a lot of heart.”

In other soccer news, the Central Kitsap girls took care of Shelton 4-1 Tuesday to move into third place overall in the Narrows League. The Lady Cougars (6-2-2, 3-1-2) have lost once since Sept. 14, when they dropped a match to NK 2-0, and seem to be hitting their stride at the perfect time.
The team is at Stadium at 7 p.m. today.

During halftime of Tuesday’s KSS-Oly girls soccer game, I managed to catch the tail end of the KSS-Oly volleyball match. KSS, which has yet to win a match, lost 3-0.
Olympic coach Keith Peden had some nice things to say about the KSS team:
“They are rebuilding, they’ve only got one senior. But they look better than I’ve seen Klahowya look in a long time. They are coming along.”