The George Mason High School girls soccer team lost to Brentsville 5-3 at home on Tuesday.
This was the Mustangs’ fourth consecutive loss.
“I think they out-battled us,” said Mason head coach Jennifer Parsons. “At the end they won almost every fifty-fifty ball in the second half. That was the difference: They won those balls, and converted them into goals.
“We’ve been a very physical team in our scrimmages earlier in the season,” Parsons continued. “I don’t know what has change. Tonight the battle part wasn’t there, and the other team took advantage.”
The game with Brentsville was a back-and-forth affair for much of the match. Down 1-0, the Mustangs got on the board in the seventh minute when Claire Trevisan connected with a goal off of a Leah Roth assist. Later in the match, down 2-1, Mason again knotted the contest when Roth scored from a Trevisan assist.
After Brentsville took a 3-2 lead, Roth and Trevisan again hooked up, this time with Trevisan scoring from a Roth pass.
However, Brentsville scored in the 50th minute to take the lead, and then put the match away in the 77th minute.
Trevisan finished with two goals and an assist, and Roth had one goal and two assists.
This was Mason’s first match since the previous Tuesday when the team lost to Heritage High 3-0 at home. The team has also come up short against Loudoun Valley and Kettle Run high schools during the four-game slide. The Mustangs are now 2-4 for the season.
“We need to stat competing and winning the fifty-fifty balls all over the field,” Parsons said. “Our forwards are doing a really good job of it. But then it’s just really inconsistent on the rest of the field. I think once we find some success with doing that, I think it’ll start to change.”
The coach added that she did front load the first part of the schedule to get her team ready for Bull Run District play.
“I think the result was completely fair,” Parsons said of the loss to Brentsville. “I definitely think they outplayed us.”
Roth said that facing tough competition like Brentsville will help prepare the Mustangs for upcoming District competition. She also had a theory on her team’s four-game skid.
“I think it’s a mental situation,” she said. “I think we sometimes get complacent.”
Mason welcomes Manassas Park at home tonight at 7 p.m. to open Bull Run District. Then next Tuesday the team faces tough rival at Clarke County.
“We’ll see,” Parson said when asked if her team is ready for District play. “I think we are. I like that we’re going to be home to start the Bull Run District. Our big rivals are Clarke and Madison, so I like that we don’t have to go right in and face one of them off the bat. I’m hoping that we can get our confidence back and get back to ourselves by Thursday and use that momentum going into next week. Next week’s definetely a big week. That’s make or break for Bull Run.”
