Temple Run: Senior lifts Bloomsburg
With her health not in question and more offensive weapons put around her, Bloomsburg’s Paige Temple saw an increase in both goals and assists while helping lead the Panthers to their first state title.
For her efforts this season, Temple has been named Press Enterprise’s girls soccer MVP.
Temple finished the year with an area-best 42 goals — a 22-goal differential from 2019. She also added 23 assists, finishing with five more than she had last season. Her 107 points for the year are the best in the region.
She — along with Southern Columbia’s Loren Gehret and Benton’s Brynn Hess — was recently named all-region and all-state. Central’s Ellie Rowe was also named all-state.
The offensive surge is something Bloomsburg coach Aaron Flook has been working on for years, making Temple one of the centerpieces.
“As an overall group, we’ve been attacking so much more,” he said. “We’ve been attacking so we get the numbers up downfield.
“One the biggest reasons for that is so that defenders can’t just mark Paige because we were able to score in a variety of ways. We had a lot of weapons on the field.”
Temple noticed teams keying in on her early in games, having two or three defenders around her. By halftime, that changed with Bloomsburg capable of finishing drives. It also meant that Paige got a lot more open looks than in years past.
Oh, and she was playing 100% healthy all year.
“The biggest difference this year was because of players like Ava Billmeyer and Brynn Zentner coming up,” Temple said. “It allowed me to create more offense.
“Also, last year, I was coming off ankle surgery and wasn’t playing my best. This year, I felt fine and was able to finish a lot more drives.”
Her personal favorite moment of the memorable campaign came in the PIAA Class 2A semifinals. With the team turning to her on a free-kick, she didn’t disappoint, scoring the game’s only goal.
Goes to show that it didn’t matter the opponent or defensive scheme, Temple knew how to get the job done.
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