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Delaney Baie Pridham scored her league-leading ninth goal of the season as the Ottawa Rapid defeated the Calgary Wild 3-1 in Northern Super League action on Saturday in Ottawa.
Pridham has nine goals in nine games for the Rapid (4-3-2), who are third in the six-team league with 14 points.
WATCH | Rapid climb up NSL standings with victory over Wild:
Ottawa defeated Calgary 3-1 Saturday after a goal and an assist by Melanie Forbes sealed the deal Saturday in NSL action.
Melanie Forbes had her first career goal and an assist off the bench for Ottawa on her 26th birthday. Nicola Golen also scored for Ottawa.
Sonia O’Neill had the only goal for the Wild, who fell to 3-4-2 and remained in fourth place, ahead of Vancouver on goal differential.
Pridham opened the scoring in the 32nd minute with a shot redirected off the goal post.
Forbes put Ottawa up 2-0 in the 65th minute, then set up Golen’s first career NSL goal in the 87th.
“It feels great,” Forbes said. “It’s like icing on the cake, literally.”
Golen’s goal came after O’Neill had cut Ottawa’s lead to 2-1 in the 83rd minute, 10 minutes after she came into the game.
“You could tell a lot of our players were tired because of the heat so when you come off the bench it’s your job to get that push and help the team,” O’Neill said. “With how close everyone is in the standings, we know goal differential is important, so even if we didn’t win the game, I knew it was important to score.”
AFC Toronto overtake Tides
Later Saturday, Kaylee Hunter scored twice as AFC Toronto defeated the visiting Halifax Tides 3-1 to take over first place.
Halifax took an early lead on a Toronto own goal five minutes into the game, but Hunter’s brace and an insurance marker from Esther Okoronkwo improved Toronto’s record to 6-3-1 for 19 points, two ahead of the league-leading Montreal Roses.
WATCH | Kaylee Hunter scores twice, AFC Toronto downs Halifax Tides:
AFC Toronto rolls past the Halifax Tides, 3-1, as Kaylee Hunter scores the game-tying and game-winning goals.
It was Toronto’s fifth win in the team’s last six games, and the first come-from-behind victory of the season.
Assistant coach Sylvia Forbes said Toronto’s resilience is a good sign of things to come.
“We remember how we feel in the tough moments and then, we remember how we feel in these good moments. We understand that the work hasn’t stopped. We expect the players, we expect us as a staff to get better each and every week,” said Forbes.
“This is a long season with a lot of really good teams in the league and we enjoy these moments. Then we get back to work after.”
The last-place Tides fell to 1-6-1.