LYNN — Asiah Dingle is one of the premier girls basketball players in the Boston area. It turns out that the Kent State-bound Dingle from Archbishop Williams is not bad at soccer either.
Dingle scored a hat trick at Manning Field Monday as the Bishops defeated St. Mary’s, 4-2, in an entertaining game that featured some stellar goaltending from the Spartans’ Alex Iacoviello.
“If it wasn’t for her,” said. St. Mary’s coach Jim Foley, “it would have been a lot worse than it was. They are a very good team.”
Iacoviello was pressed into action early as she was forced to make two point-blank saves on Williams’ Chigozie Sumani before the game was 10 minutes old.
After relentless pressure in the St. Mary’s end, Wiliams finally got on the board, with Dingle slipping by a defender and lofting an odd-angle shot that left Iacoviello helpless as it buzzed by her.
St. Mary’s pressed hard to get the equalizer, but Julia Nickolau’s bid in the 25th minute didn’t materialize. Instead, she and Williams keeper Kaylee Walsh collided and and fell in a heap in front of the goal mouth.
Both ended up well enough to return to action, with Nickolau getting one of St. Mary’s two goals.
Again, a few minutes later, St. Mary’s was back on the doorstep, with Katie O’Neill testing Walsh, who proved more than equal with a point-blank save.
“Our problem all season has been that we just can’t score,” Foley said.
Despite plenty of action, though, the half ended with Williams up, 1-0.
Early in the second half, Williams doubled its advantage when Dingle scored a very nice goal. Sumani provided the cross, and Dingle never had to move, redirecting the ball into a wide-open net.
“Their goals were the result of some great individual plays,” said Foley. “Nothing (Iacoviello) could do on either one of those.”
Nor was there much she could do with Dingle’s third score. She kicked a high, arching shot that just eluded Iacoviello as she jumped high in the air to try to knock it out. She got a piece of it, and it almost became a great save. Instead, it spun backward into the net.
One would have expected the 4-6-3 Spartans to pull back in attempts not to make things worse, but instead they went on the attack, something Foley appreciated.
“I’m really glad we didn’t pack it in,” he said.
Jocelyn Deschenes got one back with 6:20 left in the game, with her direct kick sailing over the head of Walsh in a similar fashion to Dingle’s third goal. Then, Nickolau, who had been knocked to the ground in the first-half collision, got her revenge, picking the ball out of a jumble of bodies and putting it in the net.
Williams, however, ended any hopes St. Mary’s had of gaining a point out of the match when Arianna Hay scored inside the 2-minute mark.
Foley feels St. Mary’s can still make the state tournament.
“We have some things we have to do,” he said. “We have five games left.”
