Notre Dame-Belmont clinches WBAL title

NDB head coach Paul McCallion was out of town during that first meeting last month, but he watched the video of the game. What he saw was a Panthers team that bunkered in defensively and simply withstood the Tigers’ dominant offensive attack and then tried to catch them napping with the rare counter-attack.

Going into Tuesday’s replay, the Tigers were ready.

“I had a game plan,’ McCallion said. “We knew they would sit in (defensively).”

The plan worked to perfection as NDB scored early and often in a 5-1 rout of Woodside Priory to capture their second division title in four years and earn an automatic bid into the Central Coast Section tournament.

“We utilized our wings more … and then getting crosses to our center forwards,” said Julia Roche, who scored twice for the Tigers.

NDB wasted little time in going on the attack, earning a corner kick in the game’s first 30 seconds, which results in a shot that was saved by Priory’s goalkeeper, who finished with 13 saves on the day.

“Our game strategy is to attack early and press,” Roche said.

That the Tigers did. In the second minute, Razan Asmar sent in a cross that was handled by the goalkeeper. Makena Conneely had a ball ricochet off her on goal and Athena Carvallo also got a shot off in the fourth minute — both of which were saved.

In the sixth minute, the Tigers managed to do against Priory what they were incapable of doing in 80-plus minutes prior — they scored. Taleah Mendoza ran down a ball on the left flank and served into the middle where Roche was waiting and tapped it in for a 1-0 NDB lead.

The Tigers continued their assault on the Panthers goal as they would go on to finish with 13 first-half shots, nine of which were on frame.

“You have to use the whole field,” McCallion said on how to attack a defense-first team. “Play it wide. Force them to come out (of their defensive shell). And then slip the ball into space.”

That attack worked perfectly on the first goal, while the second was more traditional, coming off a corner kick in the 19th minute. Mendoza played a low, hard pass on the ground to the middle of the Priory penalty box, at which point NDB sweeper Viva Vorzimmer ran on, unmarked, and swept in the cross for a 2-0 NDB lead. Conneely’s headed attempt off the fifth corner of the half for the Tigers was just high as the halftime whistle sounded.

While the Tigers enjoyed a 2-0 halftime lead, the precision attack that exemplified the opening 20 minutes got choppy over the rest of the half. That choppiness continued in the second half, which McCallion chalked up to shuttling players in and out of the game.

“We got 22 players into the game,” said McCallion, which happened to be the entire roster. “That was nice.”

And even as disjointed the attack was at times, it was more than Priory could handle. NDB took 10 more shots in the second half, seven of which were on net. They increased their lead to 3-0 on Roche’s second goal of the game — which was almost a carbon copy of the first. Again, Mendoza ran down a ball on the left wing and, again, served a cross to the front of the goal. Roche ran to the near left post and had her first shot blocked by a Panther defender. Roche, however, collected the rebound and slipped it past both the defender and goalkeeper, and just inside the post for the goal in the 52nd minute.

Seven minutes later, it was 4-0 when a ball deflected out to Asmar 25 yards from goal and her shot someone made its way through the traffic in the penalty box and slid inside the far left post.

The Panthers finally caught the NDB defense slipping as Natalie Ruiz ran onto a ball over the top of the Tigers’ defense. She held off a challenge from a defender and slotted a shot past the goalkeeper and into the left corner in the 61st minute.

Abby Damelio rounded out the scoring for the Tigers just before the final whistle, bodying in a cross from Cassie Hickson.

For McCallion, the win marks his second WBAL title in four years and the 19th of his high school coaching career, which started in the now-defunct Hayward Area Athletic League in the East Bay.

He says winning titles never gets old.

Roche, a junior, was also on that title winning team three years ago and adds it to the Central Coast Section title the Tigers won last year. She also said winning championships is never tiresome.

“I always love it because it’s a team effort and the team is always different year to year,” Roche said. “Plus, I like winning things.”

NDB (8-0-1 WBAL Foothill, 25 points), with only Friday’s regular-season finale against Menlo School left to play, has an insurmountable four-point lead.

“We knew we had to win or tie (Tuesday) to win league,” McCallion said. “(Now) just look forward to CCS.”