It was a crazy opening round of the Region VI women’s soccer tournament.
Two upsets and one near upset among the four matches played.
Fortunately for Barton, it was the near upset as the higher seeded Cougars advanced with a nail-biting 1-0 win over Johnson County.
Barton scored its only goal of the game with 15 minutes left in the match to secure the win and set up a date with Jayhawk East champion Kansas City Kansas.
The 10th ranked Blue Devils had to work themselves to knock off the West’s fourth seed Dodge City, winning 3-1.
The semifinal contest will be Saturday at Stryker Park in Wichita with opening kick set for 2 pm.
The first semifinal of the day will pit Hutchinson and Butler.
Butler handed Jayhawk West champion and 16th ranked Cowley an opening round loss on Tuesday. The contest was moved to Winfield due to poor conditions at Cowley’s field. Butler trailed 1-0 at half but scored twice in the final half, including the game-winner with 11:36 left for the 2-1 win in a pretty significant upset.
Hutch also won the road, defeating East runner-up Coffeyville, 3-1, in what might be considered a slight upset.
Barton and Johnson slugged it out for the opening 45 minutes without a goal. The Cavaliers outshot Barton 6-4 in that first half.
The Cougars began to control play more in the second half and finally split the pipes when Annika Gerdau sent a cross to the backside for Fatima Leme to one-time it into the net.
Leme’s goal came with just 15:05 left in the match.
Barton finished out those 15 minutes without allowing a shot on goal as the Cougars shutout the Cavaliers to move into the semifinals.
The two teams combined for just nine shots on goal – six by Barton and three by Johnson.
Barton 1, Johnson 0
Johnson 0 0 – 0
Barton 0 1 – 1
Barton – Leme (Gerdau), 74:55
Region VI Playoffs
1st Round
Wednesday
E4 Butler 2, W1 Cowley 1
W3 Hutch 3, E2 Coffeyville 1
E1 KCK 3, W4 Dodge 1
W2 Barton 1, E3 Johnson 0
Semifinals
Saturday, May 22
12 pm – W3 Hutch (7-3-3) v E4 Butler (6-8)
2 pm – E1 KCK (12-1-1) v W2 Barton (11-3-1)
Finals
Sunday, May 23
3 pm – Semifinal winners
