Without question, the Liverpool girls soccer team that heads into the Section III Class AA playoffs is a unit that has started to click in all phases of the game. What’s more, the Warriors are not showing any fatigue, for it played six times in the last 12 days of the regular season and winning five of them. The lone exception was Whitesboro. One good part is that Liverpool doesn’t’ have to face Whitesboro in the Section III Class AA playoffs – for which it is quite thankful. Twice, these Warrior soccer powers collided, and both times Whitesboro came out on top, including last Wednesday night’s 2-1 game played in Marcy. Early in September at LHS Stadium, the two sides went to overtime tied at 3-3 before Whitesboro’s Ashley Williams scored a natural hat trick in the 20 minutes of OT to help her side prevail 6-3. Here, in the rematch, the damage was incurred early. Williams scored in the first half, as did Brie Heitz, while Jennifer Deuel picked up an assist. Down 2-0 at halftime, Liverpool would fight back, getting within one on Alexis Kline’s unassisted goal, but it could get nothing more past Whitesboro goalie Emilee Mull, who recorded 13 saves. Before that, Liverpool returned home last Monday to take on Auburn and unleashed a more balanced attack in a 6-0 shutout of the Maroons. Having depended so much on Ore Akinpelu (who got all the goals as Liverpool beat Baldwinsville 2-0 and Oswego 1-0) in recent games, Liverpool wanted to make sure that others got involved on the offensive side. That certainly was the case against Auburn, the Warriors sprinting out to a 4-0 halftime edge. Best of all, Akinpelu didn’t even get a goal as her teammates gladly stepped up. Emma Geyer led the charge, scoring twice, with Kline, Morgan Wright, Kaitlin Aiello and Logan Rubio each nabbing single goals. Akinpelu was one of five Warriors to pick up assists, joining Alyssa Bittel, Breanna Sharpe, Marissa Lombard and Jennifer Higgins in that column. Perhaps without knowing it, Liverpool’s regular-season finale at West Genesee on Saturday served as an 80-minute sneak preview, even as the Warriors were holding off the Wildcats 2-1. Thanks to goals by Akinpelu and Bittel, Liverpool moved out in front in the first half, even as Brianna Corcoran got on the board for the Wildcats. Sharpe got credit for an assist. WG goalkeeper Andrea Francisco, back from an injury that caused her to miss most of the season, made eight saves and blanked the Warriors in the second half, even as her teammates could not get anything past Rebecca Phillips-Allen (four saves) to force overtime. Still, it had to give the Wildcats encouragement because, when the Class AA playoff pairings were announced, WG found itself with the no. 7 seed – and Liverpool had the no. 2 seed. So it’s a third encounter between the Warriors and Wildcats Thursday at 5 p.m. in the quarterfinal round, with the winner getting Cicero-North Syracuse or Rome Free Academy in the semifinals.