In soccer, giving up early goals can put a team in a desperate position and that's exactly where the Zephyrs found themselves Tuesday night in the first round of the PIAA Tournament. Three goals in just over 18-minutes left Whitehall in a deep hole that they wouldn't be able to dig out of to prevent their season from coming to an end.

Madison Mohr had two goals and two assists for Elizabethtown, who were the District Three runner-ups and Whitehall's opposition in the first round of states.

Mohr assisted on the first goal by Emily Bitner and then scored back-to-back goals just 45-seconds apart to give the Lady Bears their three goal lead.

"I knew that they were going to be decent coming out of that district, but I was a little worried with our team, because we started off really slow in three of our last four games," said Whitehall head coachDave Weitzman. "We gave up a goal very early against Nazareth, so I was a little worried about how we were going to come out today. I thought giving up that goal in the first 12-minutes really put us back on our heels."

Senior Madison Walker knew the early goal was tough to overcome.

"I definitely think that when they scored early, it was really hard to come back from that and I think that we maybe played a little frantic as they started scoring," she said, "but I think that the second half, we came out a lot harder and really, we can't look back on regrets; it just is what it is."

Whitehall did come out much stronger in the second half, but the Elizabethtown defense only bent and didn't break. Whitehall would break through with a goal on a penalty kick by Kourtney Cunningham with 11:55 left to play, making it a 4-1 game.

That goal seemed to motivate the Zephyrs, but they were unable to get anything past back-up goalie Kiara Esoldo, who came in when starter Joy Hileman left with an injury after a vicious collision with a Whitehall player.

"It was the worst game I've seen our girls play, unfortunately. We played well all year and I thought tonight, we just didn't have that little jump in our step, that little pizazz that we needed. I thought we got beat to a lot of the 50-50 balls and I just don't think that we really played up to our capabilities and it's a shame to go out like that," said Weitzman.

Besides losing Cunningham and Walker to graduation, Whitehall will also lose goalkeeper Jude Luckenbill and forward Chyna Lewis.

Weitzman said throughout the season that he leaned a lot on seniors Cunningham and Walker, leaving some leadership holes left for the team to attempt to fill.

"I think there are a lot of underclassmen that can step up. I think Taylor George, Cara Bonshak, Jill Kreglow; I think they're all going to be an asset to the team next year and I can't wait to see how far they get," said Walker.

In some respects, the team overachieved this season, winning the District 11 Championship to get into states. One thing that may have hurt the team was depth, which concerned Weitzman since he has some players who are two-sport athletes and were literally playing a game every day in one sport or the other.

"Coming into the season with a new coach, new philosophy, with only three seniors that play on the field for us, we never really thought we would get as far as we did and we were able to accomplish a lot of great things and that goes to Maddie and Kourtney being such tremendous people and leaders," said Weitzman. "Although I'm sad to see our season end, I'm really pleased and I look forward to coming back next year and working with all of the players that are returning for next year."