KERSEY — Heading into the District 9 Class A girls soccer tournament as the No. 4 seed, the Brockway Lady Rovers knew they had some work to do if they wanted to defend last year’s title. But on Wednesday afternoon at Angela Huey Memorial Field, the Lady Rovers knocked off top-seeded Elk County Catholic, 2-1, in overtime to advance to this year’s title game against Karns City.
Lady Rover senior Amanda Decker scored both of the team’s goals — the first coming on a penalty kick and the game-winner off of a Rheanna Spinda cross in the first overtime period at 87:14.
“That was fun,” Brockway head coach Juli Esposito said of the game and the outcome. “(Spinda) put on the gas, took a couple of touches around — back, cross in … and Amanda was there. You couldn’t ask for anything better than that.”
The Lady Crusaders dominated possession in the first half among the raindrops, with Brockway’s only shot on goal coming with about 15 seconds left, but ECC wasn’t able to capitalize on any of its opportunities as both teams went into halftime scoreless.
“I think it was a mental battle that they were trying to break today,” Esposito said.
The Lady Rovers maintained as ECC continued to pressure at the start of the second half and especially after they went down 1-0 as Lady Crusader Seanna VanAlstine put one by Brockway goalkeeper Josie Orinko for the 1-0 lead at 55:55.
“We definitely controlled the ball a lot and we had possession probably the majority of the game,” ECC head coach Michaela Cashmer said. “The girls played really well. It was a very good game and Brockway played really good, too. They had a couple of nice shots and they found the back of the net and we didn’t find it.”
Brockway would then quickly tie up the game after an Eva Bisbey free kick would result in a penalty kick for a foul in the box that Decker took at the 57:42 mark. The senior then beat ECC goalkeeper Allison Geci on the right side as the Lady Rovers tied it up at 1-1.
“That was a great finish,” Esposito said of Decker’s penalty kick score.
From there, it was a back-and-forth battle as both teams would get its opportunities but came away empty as both defense came to play. Both squads hit crossbars on kicks — with Lady Crusader Sami Straub hitting one and almost getting the goal as it came down before Orinko saved it and Lady Rover Paris Stern hitting a header in close that went off the top right corner back into play.
“Honestly we didn’t make any adjustments (from the first half to the second half),” Esposito said. “We kept shutting them down so I didn’t think that we really needed to (adjust). I thought it was pretty even. They scored a goal and we countered pretty quickly off of that. We just told the girls, ‘You’ve got to keep doing what you’re doing. If you that defensive work up, eventually the offense will come. And when we go forward, we go forward together.’ And they did. They worked so hard — they wanted it so bad.”
With the start of overtime, Brockway came out of the gates firing, with Decker just missing an opportunity early and a Decker corner kick was snagged by Geci in goal.
Lady Crusader Rylie Belsole would get a free kick from long distance and the line drive was stopped by Orinko, which would later set up Brockway’s winning score.
Spinda was able to take the ball upfield and weave between ECC defenders heading up the right side before crossing it back over to Decker sprinting towards the net. Decker got the pass and put it by Geci to advance to the D-9 Class A title game next week.
Brockway (13-7) will try and make it two straight as they’ll play the No. 2 seed in Karns City, which defeated No. 3 Forest Area, 2-0, on Wednesday at a time and location to be determined.
“This was fun and I just want them to take this energy and enjoy the rest of the season,” Esposito said. “You can’t really teach much else this far along — you’ve just got to play at this point. So I just want the girls to have a fun and enjoyable rest of the season.”
Elk County Catholic finished up its season with a 15-3-1 record, with Cashmer saying one of the highlights was winning the Bucktail Tournament and beating St. Marys on penalty kicks to do so.
“Overall it was a consistent season,” Cashmer said. “We strung a lot of wins together — especially early on.”
The game also marked the final contest for the Lady Crusaders’ six seniors in Tally Cicione, Caitlyn Vollmer, Ellie Baron, Rylie Belsole, Madisyn Hetrick and Geci.
“I’ve had the seniors for three years and I’ve seen them improve greatly,” Cashmer said. “It was great to coach all six of them and it was good to see them play. We’ll miss them all next year — it’s a big class so it’ll be hard to replace all of them.”
