By PAUL GOTHAM
ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Ava Fedele snapped a scoreless tie in the 65th minute, and No. 3 Churchville-Chili (15-3-0) went on to clinch a spot in the Class AA finals with a 2-0 victory over No. 7 Penfield (10-5-1) in Section V Girls’ Soccer semifinal action from Werner Kleeman Field on the Rush-Henrietta campus, Wednesday night.
Fedele took a pass from teammate MacKenna McDowell inside the 18-yard box and lofted a shot just beyond the outstretched hands of Penfield keeper Caylyn Crane and under the crossbar for her sixth goal of the year.
Fedele’s goal came after a back-and-forth first half with neither side gaining any true advantage.
“It was definitely even in the first half,” said Churchville-Chili head coach Brooke Elnicky. “Honestly, we weren’t playing to our potential in the first half. It was a matter of getting some nerves out.”
The Saints worked for a corner kick soon after coming out of the break and were able to put together scoring opportunities including an Elise Faix shot from outside the 18-yard box that caromed off the cross bar.
Fedele’s shot didn’t draw the same enthusiastic response from the crowd as did some of the Saints’ other threats, but it was the first to find the back of the net.
“My first thought was, did that really go in?,” Elnicky said of the goal. “We had a lot better shots than that tonight, but that’s been one of our focuses this season that it doesn’t always have to be pretty.
“Elise does get a lot of the attention offensively, but the great thing is she has several teammates who fill in when they need to.”
Tessa Wood made three saves for the shutout – Churchville’s sixth straight clean sheet.
Penfield opened the season with three wins in its first seven games before starting to string together victories.
The Patriots came into the Wednesday’s action winners of four straight including a 2-1 victory over second-seeded Greece Athena ranked No. 14 NYSSWA Class AA at the time.
“All season long we’ve been taking it one game at a time,” Elnicky said. “Tonight was no different. We are always focusing on what we can control. We weren’t focused on what was going on around us. As soon as we won in the quarterfinals, then we looked at our next opponent.”
Jilliyan Ewing sealed the game in the final minute of play with her eighth goal of the season.
Churchville will make its first appearance in the finals since 2022. The Saints will face either top-seeded Spencerport or No. 4 Webster Thomas.
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