5-6A storylines aplenty as girls soccer hits midpoint

With last week’s winter storms in the rearview mirror, District 5-6A’s boys and girls soccer programs resumed their conference schedules on Monday.

The rash of inclement weather postponed the entirety of last week’s district slate, forcing several teams into a compacted few days on the pitch — adjusting the week’s schedule for matches on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

As teams make up for lost time, the girls hit the midpoint of their conference schedules — having seen everyone at least once throughout the district round robin.

Here’s a look at where things stand at the halfway mark of one of the area’s more competitive soccer gauntlets.

Editor’s Note: Records and statistics account for district matches played through Wednesday.

No. 1 with a bullet

Prosper had the make-up of a state championship contender last year before having its season curtailed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

With plenty of experience back from a squad that was nationally ranked in 2020, the Lady Eagles are currently slotted No. 1 in Class 6A by the Texas Girls Coaches Association, and fans would be hard pressed to argue otherwise.

Prosper exited Wednesday’s 6-1 victory over McKinney Boyd still undefeated at 14-0 and sporting some of the gaudiest numbers in the state. The Lady Eagles sport a plus-25 goal differential in just six district matches played and have scored 91 goals to just four allowed all season.

Junior Hadley Murrell and senior Kaitlyn Giametta headline a deep cast of goal-scorers with Prosper finding the back of the net at least four times in nine of its past 10 matches.

It’s far from a front-running team, too: The Lady Eagles have shown they can survive low-scoring battles, topping Round Rock 1-0 on Jan. 15 and edging Allen by one goal on Monday, 2-1.

But who’s No. 2?

If the postseason results from volleyball, boys basketball and girls basketball are any indication, seeding holds plenty of weight relative to a team’s playoff prospects from 5-6A.

That’s doubly true when paired opposite a district as balanced as 6-6A, and early returns have shown a stark difference between grabbing a top-two seed and not.

In those three aforementioned sports, 5-6A’s top two seeds are 5-1 in the first round of the playoffs. The district’s third and fourth seeds, by contrast, are 0-6.

That makes the race behind Prosper all the more captivating during the second half of the district schedule, with Allen and Boyd currently knotted at 13 points apiece.

Regulation wasn’t enough to decide a victor in the first meeting between the Lady Broncos and Lady Eagles on Jan. 29, with Boyd ultimately winning a shootout to notch an extra point in the standings.

The Lady Broncos enjoyed a similar result against Little Elm, while Allen has since won four of its next five district matchups. The Lady Eagles have outscored opponents 17-1 in their four conference wins and played Prosper closer than anyone in a 2-1 loss.

Boyd, meanwhile, had allowed just two goals over its first five district matches prior to being touched by for six by Prosper on Wednesday.

The two are scheduled to rematch at 7:30 p.m. Monday in McKinney.

Race for fourth place

Little Elm is yet to qualify for the playoffs in any of the UIL bracket sports since making the jump to Class 6A but finds itself in the hunt at the halfway mark of the girls soccer standings.

The Lady Lobos are 2-3-1 and have eight points following Wednesday’s 3-2 victory over McKinney. They sit one point behind Denton Guyer (3-3-0, nine) for fourth place in the district.

Little Elm’s conference schedule has been one of extremes. Three of the Lady Lobos’ district matches have been decided by at least five goals and the other three has been decided by one goal or less.

That includes a 1-1 draw against Boyd that granted Little Elm a point against one of 5-6A’s upper-echelon programs, but the results elsewhere have put the Lady Lobos in a situation where wins are the priority for the second half of district.

Among Little Elm’s losses in league play was an 8-1 setback to Guyer on Monday — a match that did no favors for the Lady Lobos’ goal differential of minus-11, which currently ranks sixth in the district.

Factors like head-to-head results and goal differential loom large as potential tiebreakers at the end of the season, but ones where Little Elm currently trails Guyer.

The Lady Lobos rematch the Lady Wildcats on March 17 in Denton in a matchup that could very well be a must-win contest for Little Elm.

Elsewhere in the standings, McKinney sits in sixth place at 1-5 with three points and Denton Braswell is winless at 0-6.