Lovett falls from No. 1 spot; former GAC star excelling at Georgia

Here are some of the top stories in girls soccer this week:

*Rankings shakeup: Class AA Lovett fell from the top spot in the most recent Eurosport and Score Atlanta rankings after suffering consecutive losses to Westminster (2-1 in overtime) and Marist (4-0) last week to drop to 10-3 overall for the season. Greater Atlanta Christian (12-2-1) is the new No. 1 team, followed by defending state champion Westminster (5-4-3) at No. 2 and Lovett at No. 3. All three teams are members of Region 6-AA and will meet again in the regular season. Lovett will get a chance to avenge the loss to Westminster in the rematch at Lovett on Friday. The Lions beat GAC 1-0 on March 4 and will face the Spartans again at GAC on April 27.

*At the next level: Former Greater Atlanta Christian star Rachel Garcia, a freshman at the University of Georgia who was last year's Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Gatorade state high school player of the year, scored her second goal of the spring exhibition season last week in a 3-0 victory against North Georgia. Garcia earned the starting role at center forward in the fall and finished her first regular season with a team-leading five assists to go along with three goals for a total of 11 points, which ranked No. 3 on the team. Garcia was a four-year starter at GAC and finished her career there with 146 goals and 46 assists and scored a school-record 53 goals in 2013.

*Test for Hoyas: Harrison, ranked No. 1 in Class AAAAAA by Score Atlanta and No. 2 by Eurosport, faces what likely will be its most difficult challenge remaining in the regular season when it hosts South Forsyth on Friday in a non-region match. Harrison, which won a state title in 2011 and was the runner-up last year, is 12-0 with nine shutouts and has allowed just three goals this season. South Forsyth (No. 8 in Score Atlanta, No. 9 in Eurosport) is 9-3 and has won consecutive games against Centennial and Lambert since its last loss, 1-0 against Duluth on March 18. Harrison concludes the regular season with games against Centennial (6-7), Kennesaw Mountain (6-4), South Cobb (0-12) and North Paulding, which is 10-3 and ranked in Class AAAAA.

*Noteworthy: Three schools have both their boys and girls teams at No. 1 in this week's Eurosport rankings. They are McIntosh (15-0 boys, 13-0 girls) in Class AAAAA, St. Pius (12-4 boys, 12-3 girls) in AAA, and GAC (15-0 boys, 12-2-1 girls) in AA. The other No. 1 girls teams in Eurosport's rankings are Grayson in AAAAAA, Marist in AAAA and First Presbyterian in A.