For the start of the 2023 Girls Soccer season, the Lady Cadets hosted a familiar rival in the North Putnam Lady Cougars. Tonight’s game was the first game of the season for Cascade and the third game for North Putnam, who have gone 1-1 in their first two games. Cascade and North Putnam met last in the Sectional competition of 2023 (the Cadets defeated North Putnam 9-0) and the Cadets are on a five game winning streak against the Lady Cougars. With Cascade moving back into the Western Indiana Conference next season, these two teams will become conference opponents again. The Lady Cadets start the 2023 season with 11 returning players from the 2022 Sectional winning roster and a large addition of freshman players onto the team. The North Putnam Lady Cougars are starting the 2023 season with a new coach and 15 returning players who are attempting to change the past experience of the last couple of soccer seasons. As the Lady Cadets struggled to settle the ball and make clean passes, the Lady Cougars were able to earn quality first touches and remained just a step ahead of the Lady Cadets movements for most of the first half. After 15:00 minutes had passed off the game clock, North Putnam had pushed the soccer ball into the Cadets defensive third of the field over 12 times and had taken 5 shots on goal. The Cadets Goalkeeper Zoey Wyneken stopped all of these early shots cleanly but it showed that the Lady Cougars were ready for a new era of play and the Cadets needed to pick up their intensity. Over the next 25:00 of the first half, the Cadets moved the ball much better and kept the Lady Cougars on their back foot with driving passes that penetrated their defense. The offensive duo of Creedance Chittenden and Anna Burns kept pushing the Cadets offense deep into the North Putnam end of the field in the first half but they could never get that right rhythm to open up the scoring. By the time that Anna Burns finally scored the only goal of the game with 23:37 remaining in the first half, both Creedance and Anna had taken good shots that just missed being goals. But just missing or being just a little bit off was the theme of the night for the Lady Cadets. Sloppy play in the midfield as well as slapping passes that had no real intended target just limited the Cadets ability to organize and constructively build an offensive rhythm for most of the game. As the Cadets and Cougars got more worn down by the physical play and inconsistent pace of play of the entire second half, the Cadets started to gain more control of the game. Despite plenty of deep penetration into the Lady Cougar defensive end, the Lady Cadets couldn’t manage a second goal on the night and the game ended in a 1-0 win for the Lady Cadets. The 1-0 victory for the Lady Cadets starts this season off with a hard fought win over an improving North Putnam program. The Lady Cadets are now 1-0 as they prepare for their opening Indiana Crossroads Conference game this Saturday morning at Beech Grove High School. North Putnam’s record now stands at 1-2. Game Summary Cascade 1 - 0 1 North Putnam 0 - 0 0 Goals/Assists: G: Anna Burns (1) 23:37 1st H MaxPreps Highlight Video: https://www.maxpreps.com/in/clayton/cascade-cadets/soccer/girls/media/videos/?videoid=5479b933-122e-48a8-b9b9-004e30c6ba88