Clarkdale High School’s Kellye Phillips slips the ball through a Morton High School defenders legs Thursday night.

With Thursday’s game being Clarkdale High School’s last before the holiday break, head soccer coach Brandon Rodgers hoped to use his team’s contest against Morton High School as an opportunity to close out the first half of the season in resounding fashion.

His players did just that, and some.

Rodgers pulled his starters midway through the first half as the Lady Bulldogs (9-5-2) scored seven first-half goals en route to a 10-0 home victory over the Lady Panthers.

Mary Ashley Culpepper, an eighth grader, sent the first of Clarkdale’s 10 goals screaming through the net just 1:39 seconds into the opening half. Culpepper said the win gives her team momentum heading into the final half of the season.

“We’ve done well so far; we’ve had a good amount of wins,” she said. “I feel like we’ll practice really hard over the Christmas break, and I feel that we’ll come back strong.”

Junior Skylar Spears tallied Clarkdale’s third goal of the evening in the sixth minutes. The goal was Spears’ 18th of the year. She also added an assist.

“Everybody got to get a little playing time and was able to go in,” Spears said. “I was able to get a goal, and it felt good to get my 18th goal of the season. It’s always good to assist my teammates and let them have fun scoring and watch them get excited. Hopefully, over the Christmas break, we’ll get some practice and come out strong for our district games.”

Ravynne Wilson scored two goals, and Peyton Rigdon, Sharon Pech, Brooke Robinson, Kellye Phillips, Laikyn Wilson and Nikki Boutwell scored one goal apiece for the Lady Bulldogs. Rigdon tallied two assists.

“We’ve been able to finish on a strong run for the last few games, and we’ve actually been able to get everybody back healthy — we’ve been missing a lot of players for the beginning part of the year,” Rodgers said. “We really were looking to end the first half of the season strong and get ready for the second half. This was an opportunity to get everyone some playing time, and really just work on moving the ball around and really improve our possession style of play.”

CLARKDALE BOYS 7, MORTON 1

Following the Lady Bulldogs’ lead, the Clarkdale boys posted a strong showing to close out the first half of their season in the series’ nightcap, defeating the Panthers 7-1 behind two goals apiece by Chase Stephens and Reggie Pech.

Head coach Steven Dennis said the Bulldogs’ (5-7-4) brutal early season schedule proved beneficial, as they played outstanding soccer for 80 minutes.

“We’ve been playing some very tough teams getting ready for district (play),” Dennis said. “So I thought it all came together tonight for us. I thought they moved the ball well; I thought they played unselfishly; I thought they played as a team. You could tell the competition we’ve been playing paid off tonight.”

CJ Harris and Reed Perry scored in the first half to join Stephens and Pech. Pech’s two goals in the contest came in the 17th and the 38th minute into the opening half.

Stephens scored his second goal of the game in the 63rd minute, and Ethan Ngqyer added Clarkdale’s final goal in the 65th minute.

Dennis said Thursday’s performance was perhaps the best he’s seen from his team all season, and he expects his players to build on their strong play to begin the new year.

“I told them (in) the first half that it was about as well as I’ve seen them play a half,” he said. “I feel good about the momentum going into district play.”