By Roger Gordon

Correspondent

Southeast has been perfect thus far in 2025, and we’re not just talking about its 4-0 record.

Going into Wednesday, the Pirates had taken the word “perfect” to a new level: They haven’t even yielded a single goal!

This despite the fact that head coach Dean Dunlavy lost seven of eight players combined at the midfielder, fullback and goalie positions to graduation last spring.

“This is my 29th year as a head coach, and I don’t remember ever starting a season with four straight shutouts,” said Dunlavy. “It goes back to our defense. We have so many new players playing midfield, fullback and goalie, and they’ve just jelled. They’ve been playing great defense and then feeding our offense.”

Southeast’s latest two bagels came by 8-0 Aug. 25 at home over Crestwood and by 7-0 Aug. 23 at Orwell Grand Valley.

Pacing the Pirates in the win over the Red Devils was sophomore forward Grace Wheeler, who scored the game’s first four goals. Senior forward Ari Fiorentino scored two goals, and juniors Alexis Hurd, a midfielder, and Destiny Longgood, a forward, had a goal apiece.

Senior midfielder Sarah Craver dished out two assists. On top of that, Southeast gave up just a single shot on goal the entire game.

Wheeler has been an offensive machine this season.

She tallied a career-high five goals, including four in the first half, in the win over the Mustangs. After her fifth goal early in the second half, she was moved to defense.

Who knows how many goals she would have totaled had she stayed on offense?

At one point in the opening stanza, Southeast scored three goals in 1 minute, 52 seconds.

“Grace has great composure in front of the goal, she reads the defense and then makes moves based upon where the defense is. And she’s cashing in,” Dunlavy said. “Last year, as a freshman, she had 32 goals. This year she has 12 goals in four games.”

Also in the win over Grand Valley, Craver had two goals and two assists.

“Sarah is a nice complement to Grace,” said the coach, “because Sarah is starting our offense and feeding Grace some good balls.”