LISBON — It’s hard to imagine many teams keeping Deliah Schreiber and Lisbon off the scoreboard for an 80-minute girls’ soccer game.

Now, Hall-Dale has done it twice, including Saturday morning on the stage where it mattered most.

Eva Shepherd and Dani Sweet each scored a goal and No. 9 Hall-Dale’s defense did the rest in a 2-0 Class C West preliminary round shutout of No. 8 Lisbon.

“We had to stay in front of them, because they have some girls with good ball skills that are pretty quick,” Shepherd said. “We did a good job containing them.”

Clio Barr assisted both goals for the Bulldogs (10-5), who will travel to No. 1 Madison in the quarterfinals. The Greyhounds concluded their campaign at 8-4-3.

Olivia Maynard made five of her seven saves in the first half for Hall-Dale. The left post stopped two more point blank bids by Lisbon, one on each side of intermission.

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“We had a nice opportunity at the end of the first half. I think it was going in and the girl was standing right on the line and she kicked it out,” Lisbon coach Jake Gentle. “The two really good opportunities they had, they put them in.”

Shepherd cashed in with 25:25 remaining in the first half. Barr skipped a low, rolling pass through a cluster of Lisbon challengers and left Shepherd in a one-on-one confrontation with goalkeeper Ali Sult.

“It went through all the defenders and somehow came to me,” Shepherd said. “I just tapped it in. It was a good pass, a good idea.”

Hall-Dale dominated play up to that point, but Lisbon carried most of the momentum into the half while pursuing the equalizer.

Maynard made a brilliant save against Kailyn Hill off Sydney Douglas’ somersaulting throw-in.

Marissa Smith, Emma Begin and Signe Lynch collaborated to snuff out Schreiber’s possession after one notable turnover.

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“We don’t really shadow people. It’s a pressure-cover, balance kind of defense where if the ball’s in your area, that’s your man-to-man and everybody else is playing zone,” Hall-Dale coach Guy Cousins said. “That way if somebody gets beat there’s a rotation for somebody else to step up and play man. It works for us because we work hard at it.”

Later, Andrea Fredericks briefly cleared Hill’s opportunity off a Schreiber corner kick. Schreiber scooted over to smother the rebound, but Maynard disrupted the redirection.

In the second half, still down one goal, Lisbon’s Katherin George rattled one off the metal on a play set up by Kaylin Le.

Sweet provided the insurance goal with 20:20 remaining on a give-and-go play with Barr.

“I was in the center just kind of kicking it around with people around me,” Sweet said. “The whole time I was thinking pass to the corner, so I just did.”

Hall-Dale won the regular-season meeting, 1-0. The Bulldogs avenged a 2-1 loss to the Greyhounds in the 2012 playoffs, one in which Hall-Dale fought back to make a game of it after losing a player to a red card.

Lisbon improved its win total by two this season despite graduating six seniors from a year ago.

“We tied the top two teams in the conference (Madison and Monmouth) and beat St. Dom’s for the first time, so the kids have a lot to be proud of,” Gentle said.

koakes@sunjournal.com


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