The Mid-Prairie girls earned a 5-0 shutout of Northeast on Friday, aided by a hat trick from Julia Boller in her first game of the season. 

“It was amazing,” Boller said about being able to play again after sitting out the first six games with an injury. “I had really been itching to get back onto the field. So it just felt really nice to be playing with my team again.”

Boller, a junior at Hillcrest Academy, led the Golden Hawks with 19 goals during her freshman season. 

On Friday, Esther Hughes dribbled through the Northeast defense and gave Mid-Prairie a 1-0 first half lead with her 13th goal of the season. A teammate found Boller near the goal and she snuck a ball in the backside to put Mid-Prairie ahead 2-0 at the half. 

“Our speed is really an advantage for our offense,” Boller said, “and just talking and communicating with each other.”

Kaitlin Martin scored early in the second half from 20-25 yards out. Her long shot deflected off of a Northeast defender into the goal.

“She’s kind of an all round player, we can put her wherever,” coach Justin Barthelman said about Martin. “She played a little bit more back, in the defensive spots tonight. With her and Kina (Miller), we want those shots to be taken from the outside, because they’ve both got the legs for it.”

Barthelman said he would like to see the team convert more of its scoring chances in preparation for tougher opponents. 

“We need to finish a little bit better,” he said. “We’re not getting that many opportunities against good teams, and we need to capitalize on those when we do. I thought our defense played pretty well tonight.” 

Boller added two more goals in the second half to give Mid-Prairie a comfortable five-goal lead.

“It’s nice to have Julia back,” Barthelman said. She adds an extra amount of speed up there. 

“Esther has been great for us these last six games, but they’ve marked her pretty hard  and she has put a lot of work in to try to get open. And I think with Julia coming back, that’s going to free her up and free Julia up. So those two up top will be dangerous against a lot of teams.”

Mid-Prairie 5, Anamosa 2

The Golden Hawks came back after falling behind 2-0 at Anamosa to leave with a 5-2 victory.

Esther Hughes scored the equalizing and go-ahead goals in the second half of the win on Tuesday. 

We just came out flat,” Barthelman said. “I think we were pretty sore after the Monday game against Solon, and it’s a long bus ride. 

“They got two goals early on us, off the backside, just not marking up, allowing two girls to run free on the backside. So it was just a little bit of miscommunication. And then we were able to start getting more opportunities.”

Evelyn Gerber pulled the Golden Hawks within a goal at halftime with her first score of the season, coming on a long free kick from about 30 yards away. 

“And then Esther kind of did what she does and kept pressuring the defense to get two goals,” Barthelman said. “We just need to keep being aggressive. Keep going. Keep attacking. Now we’ve just got to do it against good teams with good defenses.”

Protecting a one-goal lead, Sophie Baker scored twice during the final five minutes of the game to secure the victory.