THOMASVILLE – Thomas County Central’s girls soccer team is locked in as a number three seed in the upcoming Class 5-A playoffs. Though the Lady Yellow Jackets will not be at home when the playoffs start next week, they should not be taken lightly.
Following Central’s 2-1 loss to Northside-Columbus last Friday, the Lady Yellow Jackets have won seven of their last nine, heading into Tuesday’s game against Lowndes.
“We’re going to be a tough three seed to match up with. If I’m being totally honest, we messed up and gave a game away early in the season against Veterans and then lost 3-2 to Houston County, the region champions at home,” Central coach Tony Voyles said. “We were right there with them. One, two and three in our region were pretty even teams, in my opinion. We’re going to be a pretty tough three seed, I think.
“I really do like where we are as we’re getting late in the season.”
Central lost at Veterans 2-1 on February 21 and twice to Houston County, leading to Veterans finishing second and Central number three in region two. Part of Voyles’ optimism stems from his team’s ability to play strong defense. Central has not allowed more than three goals in any game this year.
“I think we’re really strong defensively. We have our two center backs (Celeste Owens and Mackenzie Smith) back and our goalkeeper (Emma Brumbley) back from last year. We’re very good defensively” Voyles said. “As the season has gone, we’ve really started to figure out how to score some goals and things like that.”
Central should also be at full strength once the playoffs begin as well.
“We’ve got a couple of injuries. We don’t play this upcoming Friday but the following Friday. We’ve got a couple of weeks to heal up,” Voyles said.
Paige Parkerson scored Central’s only goal on Friday.
Central’s boys won their game on Friday 2-1.