Fresh on the heels of his team’s thrilling come-from-behind victory against St. Paul’s, McDonogh girls soccer coach Harry Canellakis entered Wednesday’s clash against Archbishop Spalding sporting positive vibes that his Eagles could successfully ride the momentum gained from that overtime win.

If Canellakis has similar feelings about random numbers any time soon, he should invest in some lottery tickets as the No. 7 Eagles showed no signs of slowing as they dominated host and second-ranked Cavaliers, 3-0, in an IAAM A Conference match in Anne Arundel County.

Behind goals from Elle Long, Kate Levy, and Maddie Rose and a stifling defense, the defending IAAM A champ Eagles improved to 5-2-1 overall and 2-1-1 in IAAM A play.

“I think the last game (against St. Paul’s) got us going,” Canellakis said. “We were down 2-0 and then we won 3-2 in overtime. We scored like three goals in the last seven minutes. I had a feeling that was going to carry over to this game, and it did. The kids played well today.”

That was especially the case in the back as the defensive quartet of Long, Addison Mahaney, Emma Sherman, and Lexi Terry limited Spalding (7-2-1, 1-2 IAAM A) to just three shots, two on goal, as they smothered the opposition’s attackers in the Cavaliers’ final third of the field.

One such example came with just 19 minutes left in the first half when Terry was able to contain Riley Wills during a one-on-one breakaway that was eventually lost out of bounds by Wills.

“The other center back (Mahaney), me and her have actually been playing together for so many years and we finally figured out how to communicate with each other and what works best for each of us,” Terry said. “We’ve gotten in a groove. We want to get first or second seed, so this was great.”

With three attackers staying high and constantly moving forward, McDonogh held greater possession and proved to be the much more dangerous team on its final third in the first half while also limiting the attack of Spalding’s wing defenders, who were preoccupied with slowing the likes of Rose and Levy among others with little success.

Levy had a hand in all three McDonogh goals, including the team’s opening strike, a penalty kick sent into the back of the net by Long as Levy was taken down in the box after beating her defender deep inside the penalty area. Long then sent a ground ball shot into the right side of the goal with 31:30 left in the opening half.

Standing on the 18-yard football mark, Levy pivoted to her right and sent an angling right-footed shot into the right-hand corner of the goal for a 2-0 lead with 9:19 remaining before halftime.

“I’m a left-footed player, and I’m told to shoot with my right all of the time,” Levy said “My outside back, Emma (Sherman) made a run, which opened up space for me in the middle, which allowed me to take a touch inside. It felt good coming off my foot.

“I feel like all season, we’ve kind of been maturing and getting better as a team. We’ve figured some things out and they’re starting to click. It’s starting to look like really good soccer.”

Spalding coach Ashly Kennedy adjusted her second-half lineup in terms of position changes and substitutions, a strategy that kept the game deadlocked largely between the penalty areas before Rose essentially put the match away with a breakaway goal off an assist from Levy.

Levy found Rose in the middle of the field between Spalding’s midfielders and defenders; Rose then took the well-placed pass, beat Cavaliers hard-charging goalkeeper Maeve Konstantoulas with a tough to her right, and then placed the uncontested shot cleanly into the back of the net with 7:12 left in the match.

This was the second consecutive conference loss for Spalding, which also fell 2-1 to John Carroll last week. The Cavaliers lost to McDonogh in last year’s league title match.

“We’ve got to move forward and respond to this loss,” Kennedy said. “We’ve got 14 seniors. I know they all want to play. They all care. We just have to go out with a mindset that we want to have a result, find ways to win.

I think we broke down. They were definitely organized. They definitely showed they wanted it more, and I think that we had some nervousness filter into what our intentions were, and our game plan, and our ability to execute. When you have, what I would say is more negative nerves than positive ones, it affected the mentality and the morale of how we played.”

No. 7 McDonogh 3, No. 2 Spalding 0

McDonogh 2 1 - 3

Spalding 0 0 - 0

GOALS: McDonogh - Elle Long, Kate Levy, Maddie Rose.

ASSISTS: McDonogh - Levy.

SAVES: McDonogh - Elyse Scott 2. Spalding - Maeve Konstantoulas 2.