Getting her groove back

This year, Cunningham had the spotlight on her. The weight of expectations to lead the Scots to a ninth PAL Bay Division title nearly overwhelmed her and the rest of the team.

The Scots did not live up to those expectations as they saw their eight-year reign end. CCS, however, is another season and Cunningham finally put everything else behind her and concentrated on just playing soccer.

The new mindset has worked to perfection. She ended the regular season with a hat trick against Menlo-Atherton and added three more in a 4-1 win over Gilroy in the first round of CCS Wednesday. Saturday, it was her determination to make a play that led to the game-winning score against top-seeded Leigh.

For her efforts, Cunningham is this week's Daily Journal Athlete of the Week.

"I was definitely nervous for this season. It was definitely very different than any other season. Before, people were setting me up for goals and I felt I needed to set others up for goals and it didn't work very well," Cunningham said. "After the M-A game, [coach Jim] Kelly asked me what happened. I said I wasn't scared. I tried to play a different type of game all season."

Cunningham is at her best when she is running at defenders, she is not a back-to-the-goal type of player, yet that was the game she was playing for most of the year. Kelly finally told her before the Menlo-Atherton game to just go and attack. He didn't want her checking back to the ball at midfield and trying to distribute the ball to others.

"She had kind of gotten into that mold of the being the supporting forward," Kelly said. "The very first game of the year, she was being real aggressive. I thought we would be all right. For some reason, that just died out. Now it's coming back. Just all kinds of confidence came out of that M-A game."

She carried it over to the Scots' first-round, CCS game, a match that saw the Scots not only playing a first-round game for the first time in several years, but on the road no less. Cunningham built on the success she had against M-A by scoring three more goals against Gilroy in classic fashion -- taking on and blowing away defenders.

"Those two games of hat tricks were huge," Kelly said. "It taught a lot to our midfielders, who are used being in a possession game. It showed them this is who we have up top. You have to feed her. If we're going to win, it's because she creates for us."

It was precisely that ability to create that led to the Scots' 2-1, upset win over top-seeded Leigh in the quarterfinals of the CCS Division I tournament Saturday. Carlmont trailed 1-0 at halftime but tied the score with three minutes left in the game. In overtime, it was Cunningham's determination that led to the winning score. She chased a long ball down the sideline, beat a couple of defenders and got her shot off. The ball bounced off the post but Jessica Edwards was there to put home the rebound.

"I haven't seen her work that hard in a long time," Kelly said. "Kelly is confident. She knows if she goes at these girls, they are going to make a mistake and she's going to go right through them.

"It was probably my fault, too, not to emphasize going on the attack. I told her, 'You make 10 runs at goal, two or three times you're going to get behind the defenders and then see what happens.'"

More often than not, the result is a Cunningham goal.