High schools across state are cheering their soccer champs
Brophy’s national-title claim denied by shutout
As soon as it ended, goalie Logan Rabaska made a beeline to the Phoenix Desert Vista students who waited behind a chain-link fence that surrounded Gilbert Campo Verde High’s soccer field. They did it. They could celebrate. The Thunder players ended Phoenix Brophy Prep’s quest for a mythical national championship and showed the resiliency and resourcefulness of a team that lost its head coach after the first game.
Trent Elliott, who took over as interim coach with every player staying on, steered Desert Vista to 11 consecutive wins, capped by Saturday’s 3-0 victory over the USA TODAY No. 1 nationally ranked team in the 6A boys soccer final.
Brophy Prep finished 21-1-2. The only other time it didn’t score was a 0-0 tie with Coppell (Texas) in early January.
Desert Vista (19-4-2) not only avenged 1-0 and 5-2 losses to Brophy Prep in December, but it also beat a nationally acclaimed Chandler team to get here.
“It was really my first year in the program,” said Elliott, who knew a lot of the players coming in. “I knew it was going to be something special. We had senior leaders. We had everything that we needed. We just had to put the pieces together.”
Athletic Director Tommy Eubanks called it “a personnel issue” as to why Elliott had to come in to take over the team early in the season. Eubanks was one of the first to embrace a waterdrenched Elliott after it was over.
Two of the bigger pieces were Rabaska and forward Max Wennes.
Wennes knew it was over as soon as he put away a shot unassisted with about three minutes to play to give his team a three-goal advantage.
“A two-goal lead is always nervewracking,” Wennes said.
Takeaways
For Rabaska, it was especially gratifying to win a state championship in a program his father, Mike Rabaska, started before he left Desert Vista in 2014 for a position with Toronto FC of Major League Soccer.
“I came here to try to do the same thing he did,” Rabaska said.
Desert Vista finished state runnerup to Brophy in 2013 when Mike Rabaska was leading Desert Vista. This was Desert Vista’s first state soccer title since 2006 and fourth overall.
After a scoreless first half, Desert Vista scored on two headers four minutes apart by Parker Lischwe and Jayden Bourg between the 28- and 24minute range.
Final word
“Honestly, we didn’t think about rankings. All we were worried about was getting it done . ... This is what they wanted. We had goals, and this was one of them. We checked them off along the way.” – Elliott