By Cort Reynolds / Photos by Mark Andreasen

ADA__The talented and deep Ada High School girls soccer team kicked off its fall 2026 season with a 9-0 blowout win against an overmatched visiting Tiffin Columbian squad on a muggy Saturday night, August 15 at War Memorial Stadium.

The Bulldog girls raced to a 6-0 lead at halftime and tacked on three more scores by the 67th minute to win easily. Ada exploited a big edge in speed, depth, talent and skill to pull off the decisive victory.

“It’s a good jumping-off game for us,” said Ada fourth-year head coach Doug Dewese. “Lots of goals and opportunities created, and keeping a clean sheet is a good plus also. It is a nice problem to have to figure out how to get 24 girls playing time due to a dominant performance.

“Super proud of the effort and team play,” he added.

Speedy junior Aliyah Kober started the scoring by booting in a direct kick to put Ada ahead 1-0, and the hosts never looked back.

Powerful junior Rose Baxter tallied the second goal. Senior Kenley Poling found the back of the net to provide a 3-0 lead. Sophomore Aubry Jordan advanced the margin to 4-0 with yet another score. 

Sophomore Shay Smith netted the fifth goal. Powerful junior Emily Shanks then poured in the sixth and final goal of the first half. TC was able to hold Ada from scoring even more over the final 12 minutes before intermission.

With 31:06 left in the game, Bulldog junior keeper Emily Gibson made a nice save of a left-side Columbian shot.

Ada got a shot on goal with 28:29 left but the busy Tornado keeper saved it. A left-side shot by TC was stopped with 24:28 left. 

At the 23:20 mark, freshman Josie Stoll put a short left side shot in the back of the net to make it 7-0.

With 20:24 left, the rugged Shanks stole the ball and fired a long shot that was saved, but not controlled. Fellow frosh Emersyn Lee seized on the rebound and set Stoll up with a nice pass to the left corner doorstep by the goal, where she put it in the net to provide an 8-0 margin.

With 13:32 to go, Jordan had her long shot blocked when the TC keeper came far out and blocked it. But Lee picked up the loose ball and floated in a shot from 20 yards out over the keeper’s head for the ninth goal.

Ada fired 29 shots on goal, earned eight corner kicks and two direct kicks as they controlled the ball throughout the mismatch.

Stoll led the potent Bulldogs with two goals. Jordan, Poling, Smith and Lee each tallied a goal and one assist. Junior standouts Shanks, Kober and Baxter all found the back of the net once apiece. 

Gibson made two saves as she and the speedy Ada defense pitched a shutout.

Ada hosts Coldwater on Tuesday, August 18 at 7 p.m. “We see Coldwater on Tuesday, and that’s going to be a good game so having something like Saturday’s game to get the ice broken on the season is great,” said Dewese.