MONMOUTH — It isn’t easy filling the void left by the school’s all-time leading scorer.

That’s the task this fall for the Monmouth girls’ soccer team. Forward Kylie Kemp has been the Mustangs go-to scorer in recent years, but with her graduation, Monmouth is in need of a new finisher.

After two games and 13 goals, the Mustangs appear to have a number of candidates.

Monmouth scored twice in the first two minutes Saturday and was up three goals in the first 10 minutes as the Mustangs cruised to a 10-0 win over Mt. Abram.

The Mustangs defeated Mountian Valley 3-1 on Friday and followed that up with morning game Saturday.

“I wasn’t sure where we were going into the season,” Monmouth coach Gary Trafton said. “I knew I had Haley (Fletcher) coming back, and she has gotten a lot better from last year. We moved Sydney Wilson up, and she’s giving us a lot more offense. Last year, we looked to Kylie and when teams shut her down, they shut us down. Now I’ve got some girls on the wing that can score too.”

Freshman Emily Grandahl scored three goals and had an assist. Fletcher and Maddie Bumann each had a pair of goals. Sammy Grandahl had a goal and an assist while Wilson, and Taylor Spadafora also scored.

“Obviously we thought it was different (without Kemp), but we’re not really worried about that,”  Fletcher said. “I think we can do fine this year. I think we work a lot better together this year.”

With a number of players up front with the ability to move the ball and finish, the Mustangs were able to hem Mt. Abram in for much of Saturday’s game and pressure the Roadrunners young defense and new goalie Abby Brackley.

“Sydney was a fullback last year,” Fletcher said. “Coach moved her forward with me. We’re both doing really good. We all play really well together. “

It didn’t take long for Monmouth’s pressure to lead to a quick goal. Sammy Grandahl had a corner kick from the right side. Shes put that right in front where it deflected in off a defender. That came just 1:32 into the game.

“I usually try to aim for the middle point on the six so everyone can run in on it,” said Grandahl. “After I kicked it, I knew it was either going to go in or the goalie was going to hit it because of the way it curved.”

Wilson followed that up with a goal at 1:55. Spadafora made it 3-0, finishing a nice cross from Caroline Bonenfant.

“We always try to come out strong to catch the other team off guard,” Grandahl said. “We want the advantage so that we have to keep playing and not let down.”

Bumann finished off a loose ball in the goal mouth. A Mt. Abram defender had already made one save in that flurry of shots. Then Emily Grandhal scored a pair and Fletcher hit a shot to build a 7-0 lead at the half.

“Overall, I think we’ll have a lot more scoring opportunities because we have more kids that can put the ball in the net,” Trafton said. “We’re a little bigger and stronger than last year.”

Mt. Abram had some fine play from Lindsay Huff, Katie Jordan and Emma Kearing up front. The Roadrunners just weren’t able to possess the ball enough to feed the ball to the forwards and create a counter attack.

The Roadrunners have just two senior starters and were coming off a 5-1 loss against Madison Friday.

Monmouth added to the lead in the second half with goals from Fletcher, Bumann and Emily Grandahl.

Mikayla Cameron and Maddie Neal combined in goal for the Mustangs shutout. Brackley had 10 saves in net for the Roadrunners (0-2).

“Everyone on this team is a very good shooter,” Grandahl said. “We all can shoot from different places. We all have different places where we like to shoot from and we have different power, but we all can score.”

kmills@sunjournal.com

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