RC Routs Alleghany In Girls Soccer Season Finale
The Rockbridge County High School girls soccer team closed out the 2026 campaign with an emphatic 8-0 Shenandoah District win over Alleghany at The Fields at Southern Virginia University in Buena Vista last Wednesday.
Lucy Boller-Pinkham made her final game in a Wildcat uniform count, scoring six goals and assisting on both of Anna Feldman’s markers as RC finished up the year with a 5-12 overall record and a 4-12 mark in district play.
Between suffering a tough 5-2 road defeat to Fort Defiance on Tuesday – a game in which the ’Cats led 2-0 in the second half – and taking the field for the second straight night in stifling heat, the Wildcats knew that they needed to take control of the match early against the Cougars (3-13 overall, 2-13 district).
Boller-Pinkham ensured that RC would do exactly that, completing her hat trick inside the first 13 minutes of the game. She drove home a pair of longrange efforts and then converted a penalty kick to give the ’Cats an early 3-0 advantage. Boller-Pinkham scored twice more in the closing minutes of the stanza as RC took a 5-0 lead into the break.
Though one player netted all five of the Wildcats’ goals in the first 40 minutes, RC head coach Carrie Dietz was pleased with the way her entire squad executed the game plan.
“After playing back-to-back games in this heat, it’s really tough for the team,” Dietz said. “We just took a strategy of trying to play pass-to-feet, small balls, so that we weren’t running as much – and we were taking care of each other, playing team ball.” There was no letup from the Wildcats after the break. Feldman bagged a rapid-fire brace early in the second half. Boller-Pinkham then rattled the crossbar on a shot in the 62nd minute before ending the game with her sixth goal six minutes later.
Caden Marshall tallied three saves to earn the clean sheet for the Wildcats, while Kaydance Bragg made five stops for Alleghany. Elsa Kerin-Rice and Allison Licona-Asto each notched one assist for RC.
Prior to the match, the Wildcats honored their graduating class: Boller-Pinkham, Kerin-Rice, Cora Conway, Alice Gresham, Reese Havird and Briana Itehua-Lopez.
Boller-Pinkham, who will continue her soccer career at Greensboro College, caps an impressive three-year run with the Wildcats with 66 goals to rank among the all-time leaders. Maria Vargas, who played for RC from 2015-2018, holds the program record with 103 goals.
And the entire class has helped guide RC to significant success on the pitch. Dietz just completed her first year at the helm after serving as an assistant on Danny Wheeler’s staff for the past two years – including the 2025 season, when the Wildcats broke the school record for victories, finishing 10-7 and advancing to the Region 3C quarterfinals.
“They’ve grown so much. They just want to do everything for the team,” Dietz said of the 2026 senior class. “It was really important for the seniors to end on a high note, and so I was really glad that the team could pull together and play really well for the seniors tonight.”
Fort 5, RC 2
RC couldn’t make its 2-0 lead stand up, as Fort Defiance’s late rally lifted the Indians to a 5-2 home win last Tuesday.
Feldman and Emily Jones scored for the Wildcats, with both goals assisted by Boller-Pinkham. But Fort (7-8-1, 7-71) tied things up as the second half wore on, and then exploded for three goals in the final eight minutes of the match to claim all three points.
RC has battled through some tough luck this season – beyond Tuesday’s late turnaround, the Wildcats suffered five defeats by two goals or fewer – making the win over Alleghany in the season-finale that much sweeter.
“We’ve had several one and two-goal games, and we’ve played really tough all season,” Dietz said after Wednesday’s victory. “When you can go out on a win and end with a high note, it just makes you excited for next season.”
