WATERVILLE — Pilar Elias’ scoring touch is well-documented. She’s netted over 100 career goals, including 45 last year as a junior and 32 this year for the undefeated Waterville Purple Panthers.
Elias essentially shrugs off the impressive totals. She’s a striker. It’s her job to score, she says. With performances such as a six-goal surge against Spruce Mountain and a four-goal outburst against Gardiner, it’s clear she doesn’t punch out early, either, even when she’s helped stake Waterville to a comfortable lead.
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Yet Waterville coach Ian Wilson sees Elias more as a facilitator than a finisher.
“She’s actually an incredibly gifted passer,” Wilson said.
“We have many kids here who can score. What Pilar really excels at is drawing pressure to herself and finding a pass to a teammate who’s in a good position to score,” Wilson said. “To be honest, that’s really what her strength is as a soccer player. She’s more like a point guard than a shooting guard. She’s a kid that really excels at setting up others.”
Wilson cites his team’s 4-0 win over Leavitt in Tuesday’s regular-season finale as a typical example of how Elias’ distribution skills are just as damaging to opponents as her goal-scoring.
The Hornets marked Elias and usually had two defenders stalking her whenever she touched the ball. Rather than get frustrated by the attention or stubbornly try to fight through the marks to get a shot off, she lured the defense into Waterville’s midfield and passed to the open teammate. She eclipsed last season’s total with her 17th assist.
“A lot of that has to do with recognizing that it’s a team sport, and as long as one of her teammates is scoring she can do things to help make that happen that might not show up in a flashy way in the headlines the next day,” Wilson said.
It took some time for Elias to realize she had plenty of scoring help after she transferred from Winslow prior to her junior year. But it helped that she felt at home with her teammates immediately, despite wearing a rival’s jersey the year before.
“They were very welcoming,” she said. “They watched how I played and got used to that, which was helpful.”
Elias’ eye-popping production helped the Panthers come within one penalty kick of a state championship.
The loss still stings for Elias and her teammates.
“That’s always in the back of our mind,” she said.
With a year of wearing purple under her belt and an offseason playing for the U16 national champion Seacoast United Mariners, Elias entered her senior year prepared to take on more of a leadership role.
“I’m more comfortable doing it, because I’m not as new,” she said. “But I’m not really the vocal type.”
Elias and the Panthers’ actions speak for themselves. They’ve outscored their opponents 79-0 and enter the Eastern Class B tournament as the top seed with a 14-0-0 record.
Most of the games, aside from a welcome 1-0 nail-biter over Maranacook last week, have been blowouts. A team that dominant could easily get bored and lose focus. But more often than not, the challenge for the Panthers has come from within.
“Coach always says let’s play the best game we play against the best team, so we always try to get better at practices and push ourselves,” said Elias, who has received a scholarship to play at Concord University, a Division II school in West Virginia.
Getting Elias to push herself is the least of Wilson’s worries. If anything, it’s the opposite.
“My job is mostly to help her ease up on herself,” he said.
Elias and the Purple Panthers aren’t inclined to let up on themselves any time soon. Not when they are this close to redemption.
“We’re just going to take it game by game and hope for the best,” she said. “But I think we’re going to go back to states and win this year.”
Randy Whitehouse — 621-5638
rwhitehouse@centralmaine.com
Twitter: @RAWmaterial33
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