By Kevin Mills,Staff Writer

MONMOUTH – Trying to replace three all-state players is no easy task.

On top of losing a trio of all-stars, the Dirigo girls’ soccer team had to fill the void of eight veteran players, many from the defense and midfield.

“I was really nervous this year,” said junior forward Katie Hutchinson. “We lost a lot of key players. I knew we had a really quick offense. So I knew we weren’t in trouble there. We just needed to focus on our defense.”

The Cougars needed to bolster their defensive game while feeding their speedy and balanced offense. Tuesday, Dirigo did just that in a 5-0 victory over Monmouth.

The Cougars had five different goal scorers and constantly kept the pressure on the Mustangs.

Deidre Gilbert is one of the lone returnees on defense, but Megan Russell has stepped in nicely while Shannon Daley, Katherine Gagne, Erica St. Pierre and Amy Gould lead a strong midfield.

“We really wanted to step up our game and get our defense involved more than we have in previous years,” said Hutchinson. “We just wanted to feed our offense as much as we could, knowing that we have speed. So midfield was pretty much the key to this game.”

Dirigo (6-2-1) outshot Monmouth 25-4 and never allowed the Mustangs (3-4-2) a chance to counter. It gave Cougar keeper Christina Chow a much-need break after being banged up in a collision against Winthrop on Saturday.

“We’ve been playing a lot of defense this year,” said Monmouth coach Steve Bodge. “We lost Bianca Cloutier (graduation) and now Jenn Lola is on the bench (with an injury). Last year, they scored 19 goals between them. Without them, we’re struggling to find goals.”

Dirigo used its defense and midfield to keep Monmouth on its heels. The Cougars have been inconsistent with the revamped lineup, but had a great team effort against the Mustangs.

“That’s been the battle all season,” said Dirigo coach Art Chamberlin. “I know where they belong, and they know where they belong. It’s just when they start playing together, they haven’t done that consistently. When they do, we look good.”

The Cougars applied pressure early and had Russell, Melissa Harvey, Hutchinson and Gagne creating chances. Brielle Brooks finally broke the ice, burying a shot inside the right post with 19:39 left in the half.

“It was a lot of motivation getting that first goal,” said Hutchinson. “We knew we could relax a little bit and keep the defense up toward the midfield. We wanted to keep the pressure on and keep the ball on our half the whole time.”

Hutchinson made it 2-0 with 13:03 when she deked past defender and slipped in a shot to her left.

Gagne set up the first two goals in the second half. She fed Harvey for a chip shot at 12:05. Then Shannon Daley had a nice header off a Gagne corner with 19:15 left. Allison Roy finished off the scoring off a cross from Brianna Elliott with 14:24 left.

“We’re playing a lot of young kids,” said Bodge. “We have four seniors and three juniors, and the rest are sophomores and freshmen. We had low numbers to begin with.”