Winter Springs denied Timber Creek its first win in the state tournament on Thursday as the Bears went on the road and scored a convincing 6-1 victory in the Class 6A girls soccer regional quarterfinals Thursday night.

Shelby Guenthardt (Photo by Scott McCall)

With less than nine minutes to go in the first half, Shelby Guenthardt went one-on-one with TCHS goalkeeper Shelby Kesic to net what proved to be the game-winning goal.

Once Kesic rushed out to make a save on the initial shot attempt, Guenthart followed up on the loose ball by placing it in the far corner of the net to give the Bears a 2-1 advantage.

“That’s her style of play, she’s very aggressive and will do anything to get the ball into the net,” said Winter Springs Coach Kurt Oettl of the senior. “And we talked about that. We wanted to follow every shot up and put pressure on their goalkeeper.”

Timber Creek had trouble on the defensive end all night and could not slow down the visiting team or even relieve much of the pressure for Kesic, a Rollins College signee.

Winter Springs Samantha Murphy and Timber Creek's Rachel Montenegro (Photo by Scott McCall)

Winter Springs added a goal on a corner kick by Samantha Murphy in the final six minutes of the first half, then extended the lead yet again in the opening seconds of the second half on a goal from Vanessa Aponte to essentially shut the door on any hope of a rally by the Wolves.

Aponte had two assists and added another goal nearly 10 minutes later, following an own-goal by the Wolves.

Despite the lopsided final score, the match started off rather competitive before the Bears managed to execute a possession-based game that got the ball up to their forwards, just as they hoped to accomplish before going in.

“We were a little worried after we went down a goal early because we knew they were a strong team, especially in the second half, so we had to make some changes,” said Oettl.

The two teams traded scores early on when TCHS junior Karen Homs, the teams leading scorer, dribbled off a defender with her back toward the goal and delivered an arching shot over the head of Winter Springs keeper Shelby Savolainen from the top of the box.

Vanessa Aponte (Photo by Scott McCall)

Then Winter Springs responded less than a minute later with a header from Christina Samper to knot the game at 1-all.

Savolainen finished with nine saves in the win to help turn away Timber Creek, who won its fourth district title and were playing in the state tournament for the sixth time.

“We’ve been good about doing that all year with responding and coming back quickly,” said Oettl.

They’ll hope to respond once more on Tuesday as Winter Springs goes on the road for a rematch of the District 3 title game against Oviedo, which they lost at Hagerty, in the regional semifinals.

– More Local Girls Soccer –

Winter Springs over Timber Creek at Orlando Sentinel

Oviedo over Freedom at Orlando Sentinel

Regional preview at Orlando Sentinel