May 30, 2023 at 7:11 a.m.
Second season starts Thursday for Hodag soccer
RHS to host Medford at Mike Webster Stadium
Second season starts Thursday for Hodag soccer
The Hodag girls will likely have to follow a very similar path if they hope to match that feat.
Rhinelander is the third seed in a nine-team half sectional as WIAA postseason play gets underway. The regional tournament begins today with a play-in game between eighth-seeded New London and ninth-seeded Antigo. Rhinelander will host sixth-seeded Medford Thursday in the regional semifinal round at Mike Webster Stadium.
The Hodags went 12-5-0 during the regular season. If coach Nathan Bates' squad wants to make it to the sectional finals, or beyond, it very well may have to avenge three of those losses.
If that plot sounds familiar, it should. The Hodag boys split with Lakeland and lost twice to Medford during the regular season last fall, but beat both in penalty kicks and then knocked off Rice Lake at advance to the state tournament.
"The girls are excited. They want to try to get another crack here and want to see how far we can go," Bates said following the team's 7-3 win over Mosinee last Thursday to close out the regular season. "We're going to practice hard going into it and try to go out and win every game we can."
Seeding for the bracket played out as anticipated. GNC champion Lakeland slotted in ahead of Rhinelander as the No. 2 seed thanks to a pair of 1-0 over the Hodags during the regular season. Ashland trumped both and earned the No. 1 seed. The Oredockers scored a 3-1 win over Rhinelander April 3 and knocked off Lakeland 5-1 April 14.
"It shook out the way that we expected it to," Bates said. "On the bottom end of the bracket it seemed like there were some things there I didn't agree with but, all and all it shook out the way it should have."
Should the seeds hold, Rhinelander would face a rematch with Lakeland Saturday night in Minocqua in the regional final round. The winner of that game will likely have to go to Ashland for another crack at the Oredockers a week from Thursday in the sectional semifinals.
First thing's first, the Hodags must take care of a Medford side that appeared to improve as the season went along.
Though the Raiders went 6-12-0 overall, they finished third in the Great Northern Conference at 5-5-0 and played well down the stretch. That included a tight 1-0 loss to Lakeland May 16 and a 3-2 victory over Northland Pines last Tuesday.
The Hodags swept the Raiders during the regular season, taking the first match 6-0 at Mike Webster Stadium April 13 and the rematch 4-0 at Raider Field May 9.
"We play well against them and I'd rather have a good game than a game where we're going to go and blow them out right away," Bates said. "If we have a good game against them and they have a good game against us, it keeps us playing tough moving on."
The Raiders have struggled offensively at times this season, ranking fifth in the GNC in goals both in conference play (1.6 GPG) and in all competitions (1.3 GPG). Their defense has been solid however. Medford is allowing 1.8 goals per game in GNC play and giving up 2.5 goals per game overall. Much of that is thanks to keeper Sophia Brunner, who had stopped nearly 80% of the shots she faced, as of the last statistical update from the conference.
"They've got a good goalkeeper. We know it's going to be some good goalkeeping," Bates said. "We've just got to come out, play our game and come out on top of it. I'm excited to play them. They gave us a good game last time, but we came away with the win. They gave Lakeland a good game. We're not going to take them lightly."
Both games against Medford were a tale of two halves for the Hodags. Rhinelander scored all six of its goals in the first 24 minutes in the first meeting. The Hodags held only a 1-0 lead at halftime in the rematch before pulling away late.
Ava Lamers and Sophie Miljevich, Nos. 1 and 2 in the GNC in scoring, have done the majority of the damage for Rhinelander in the two meetings, combining for seven of the 10 goals. Morgan Van Zile scored in the second game, Leah Weigel scored in the first game and the Hodags also benefitted from an own goal in the first meeting.
Elsewhere in the bracket Thursday, Ashland will get the winner of Tuesday's Antigo/New London game, Waupaca will host Amherst/Iola-Scandinavia in the 4-5 game and Lakeland will host seventh-seeded Mosinee.
Barron/Cumberland, which lost to Ashland and Lakeland during the regular season, got the No. 1 seed on the other half of the draw while Rice Lake, which fell to Lakeland on penalty kicks in last year's sectional final, received the No. 2 seed.
Because of the vast amount of distance between schools, Section 1 is the only Division 3 bracket that is seeded in eight or nine-team half sectionals, instead of the whole bracket 1-17. While that lessens travel in the early rounds Bates said, in years such as this, it likely cost the Hodags an opportunity to host one more game in the tournament.
"The bracket thing I'm not a big fan of, it seems like our side of the bracket is always stacked and the other side of the bracket, it seems like one team seems to walk their way through it every year. I think that that should be looked at further on," he said.
Thursday's playoff opener against Medford will kick off at 7 p.m. at Mike Webster Stadium.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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