Adam Papin/MDN - Minot’s Maicee Burke moves the ball up the pitch during the Majettes’ match against the St. Mary’s Saints on Thursday night. The game was called at halftime with Minot up 4-0 behind Burke’s hat trick.

When the Minot girls’ soccer team traveled to Bismark last month to take on St. Mary’s, the defending state champs got off to a slow start, allowing two goals in the first eight minutes before ultimately winning 6-2.

Maicee Burke and her Majette teammates made sure that wouldn’t happen again when the two teams faced off in a non-conference matchup at Duane Carlson Stadium last night. Just six minutes in, Burke opened up the scoring on an assist by Emerson Perrin to give the Majettes a 1-0 lead.

Less than three minutes later, Julia Lewis found the goal, assisted by Jayva McKibben. The Majettes never looked back, controlling the tempo the whole game and never really allowing the Saints to set up any offense.

On defense the Saints had no answer for No. 12, as Burke wasn’t done scoring. She scored her second goal in the 22nd minute and completed her first-half hat trick eleven minutes later when she put a pass from Aleah Gibbons into the back of the net to close out the scoring.

Just before the half, there was a tense moment on the pitch when Saints goalkeeper Madison Schatz got tangled up with a Minot player and had to be helped off the field with an apparent ankle injury.

At the end of the first half, Minot carried a 4-0 lead into the locker room.

That’s when Mother Nature decided to play her hand. Immediately after the horn sounded to put an end to the first half of play, it started lightning. After the mandatory thirty-minute delay and the storm not passing, the game was called with Minot on top.

The win improves Minot’s record this season to 11-0-1 (6-0-1) and extended the Majettes’ record unbeaten streak to 45 games.

Minot will welcome conference rival Jamestown to Duane Carlson Stadium on Tuesday, May 16 at 7:30 p.m.

St. Mary’s drops to 1-5-2 (0-4-2) on the year with the loss, and will host Dickinson Tuesday night at 7:30 p.m.