The East Bladen and West Bladen girls’ soccer teams qualified for the N.C. High School Athletic Association playoffs and will host first round matches next week.
East Bladen (14-6-1) is seeded No. 11 in 2A East and is scheduled to play No. 22 Rosewood (0-13-3) on Monday, May 11 at 6 p.m. The winner will play at No. 6 seed North Duplin in the second round.
West Bladen (6-11-2) is seeded No. 16 in 3A East and is scheduled to play No. 17 Pender (4-11-0) on Tuesday, May 12 at 6 p.m. The winner will play at top-seeded Wake Prep in the second round.
Admission to the matches will be $10.
Pairing were released Friday by the NCHSAA.
East Bladen finished third in the Carolina Conference behind regular season and tournament co-champions North Duplin (14-2-0) and Hobbton (14-5-0). The tournament finals between North Duplin and Hobbton was rained out.
The Eagles won their last six matches of the regular season by shutout, outscoring opponents 25-0. East Bladen beat East Columbus 4-0 in the conference tournament semifinals and lost to Hobbton 2-1 in overtime in the semifinals.
East Bladen split two regular season matches against North Duplin, losing 2-1 in overtime and beating the Rebels 3-0 at home. Rosewood lost a pair of non-conference matches to North Duplin 5-0 and 7-0. Rosewood has been outscored this season 53-4.
West Bladen didn’t get its first win until its ninth match with a 1-0 victory at Whiteville. After the 0-7-1 start, the Knights went 6-2-1 before ending with a pair of losses to Southeastern Conference champion South Brunswick. West Bladen defeated South Columbus 3-1 on April 24 to secure second place in the conference.
West Bladen and Pender have not played any common opponents this season.
Other first-round pairings, with seeding in parenthesis, involving Carolina Conference and Southeastern Conference teams are:
2A: (21) Chocowinity Southside at (12) Union
2A: (20) Lakewood at (13) Edenton Holmes
3A: (19) South Lenoir at (14) South Columbus
3A: (18) Whiteville at (15) Elizabeth City Northeastern
4A: (20) Red Springs at (13) Roanoke Rapids
2A byes: North Duplin, Hobbton
5A bye: South Brunswick
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