Last year, Aberdeen Central was forced to play on the road the entire postseason. The Golden Eagles thrived in that situation with a pair of victories and a strong performance in the semifinal. Now, Central will host an opening-round game on Tuesday when Spearfish visits Brownell Activities Complex at 4 p.m.

“The girls are just fighting their way through everything,” said Central coach Merle Aske. “We’ve been playing really good soccer these last few games. We got stuff going the way we want it to go.”

While Central and Spearfish did not play each other this season, Aske knows about the Spartans.

“They’re a pretty good team. They’re physical and they like to move the ball down the right side a little bit,” Aske said. “We just need to basically go out, we need to get pressure on them and get in their attacking third as much as possible, and just keep them under pressure so they don’t have a chance to try to get into their rhythm.”

The eighth-seeded Golden Eagles have overcome a bit of a mid-season lull and appear to be playing some of their best soccer of the season.

“I think the biggest difference is the girls have kind of finally gelled together a little bit and understand the way that the ball should be moving,” Aske said, “and how to get it into the spots that puts the most pressure on the other teams, and get cleaner looks and get shots on goal that have a better chance of going in.”

Central, 8-4-2 on the season, will be an underdog in any future postseason games if it can win on Tuesday. Aske said the Golden Eagles want to be a team that nobody wants to face.

“A lot of teams, you get in the playoffs they try to tip toe through things and hope things work out right,” Aske said. “Our way of going about things is we want to be in that situation. We want to be the ones on the field in those tough situations, and find ways to score goals and put the other team under pressure.”

Aske, who is no stranger to postseason success, knows that the safety net is now gone and it’s win or go home.

“The playoffs it’s a one and done. It’s a one-game season, basically,” Aske said. “The team that comes in and relaxes, and gets in their rhythm and plays hard and gets the pressure on the other team, is the one that’s going to come out ahead.”

Should Central win on Tuesday, it would likely have to play at top-seeded Rapid City Stevens on Saturday. However, Aske is not even thinking in those terms.

“I think the biggest thing is just staying together and making sure that we’re all on the same page and moving in the right direction,” Aske said, “and not getting ahead of ourselves. We can’t look past Tuesday. … My philosophy has always been you don’t think ahead, you don’t think what’s next. You always deal with what’s there.”