For long stretches on Friday, the Alpena High girls soccer team held its own against Petoskey.

But in the stretches where the Wildcats didn’t, the Northmen made them pay for it.

Six different players for Petoskey and the Northmen left Wildcat Stadium with a 6-1 victory in Alpena’s regular season finale.

Alpena (6-15, 2-10 Big North) was outshot 23-5 for the game and trailed 3-1 at halftime.

Petoskey scored four minutes into the game with a goal from Brooke Redes and four minutes later Isabel Anderson scored from six yards out to put the Northmen ahead 2-0.

“We gave up two early goals and then I thought it we did a nice job for a long spurt, made it 2-1 and had some quality chances and it looked encouraging,” Alpena coach Tim Storch said.

Alpena cut the lead in half almost a minute after Anderson’s goal when Chloe Ferguson got behind Petoskey’s keeper and booted the ball in.

But from there, the game belonged to the Northmen, at least from an offensive standpoint. Petoskey peppered Alpena keeper Maren Winter with shot and made it 3-1 with 4:05 left when Meghan Smith broke away from a pack of players in front and scored.

While Petoskey managed to score six times on the day, Winter turned in perhaps one of her best performances of the year, turning away several quality Northmen scoring chances to keep the game close early. With about 11 minutes left in the first half, Winter got her hands on a high kick and pushed it up to send it over the net to avoid a goal. She also stopped several point blank chances and came out of the net several times to stop Petoskey breakaway chances.

“Maren’s the story of our season. We’ve improved individually, but I’d be hard pressed to say anyone has improved more than her,” Storch said. “Her tenacity and mental toughness (has improved).”

Petoskey kept up its offensive intensity early in the second half, firing on Winter repeatedly and trying to take advantage of opportunities on corner kicks. But Winter and the Alpena defense held firm and with 22 minutes to play the score was still 3-1.

Unfortunately in the remaining 22 minutes, the wheels came off for Alpena.

“The second half, it was 3-1 with 21 minutes left in the game, but they obviously had a lot of territorial chances,” Storch said. “Unfortunately, I think what you see is their athleticism is far superior to ours.”

With 21:45 left, Hadley Haas scored on a shot that Winter got a hand on, but couldn’t quite corral. Then with 19:13 left, Petoskey made it 5-1 after Grace Kelbel buried a chance top shelf from inside the six-yard box. The play was set up when the Wildcats were whistled for an intentional pass back to Winter and the Northmen converted their chance before Alpena could set up.

Jordan Young completed Petoskey’s scoring with 13:13 left as the Northmen completed some quick passes and Young tapped the ball past Winter.

The Wildcats were outshot 12-2 in the second half and one of their best scoring chances came with about seven minutes left when Isabelle O’Neil broke away from a pair of defenders, but Petoskey’s keeper got to the ball before O’Neil could get a shot off.

The Northmen continued to keep Winter busy even in the final minutes of the game. With 4:25 left, Petoskey was awarded a penalty kick and and Megan Hannah missed with a shot off the post.

Alpena will host Traverse City West in a district game at 6 p.m. on Tuesday.

James Andersen can be reached via email at sports@thealpenanews.com or by phone at 358-5694. Follow James on Twitter @ja_alpenanews.