Downingtown East denies Spring-Ford return to state playoffs
Emma Steigerwald and Taylor Platt couldn’t look at each other.
“Don’t look at me!” Platt barked at her best friend and Downingtown East girls soccer teammate.
But it certainly wasn’t anger between the Cougars juniors. They just couldn’t help but crack each other upwhile attempting to talk about the biggest win over their scholastic soccer careers.
It was hard not to be giddy after Downingtown East scored two goals in the first 15 minutes and later withstood SpringFord’s best efforts to snatch a 2-0 victory in the District 1-AAAA fifth-place game to send the Cougars to the PIAA Championships for the first time since 2013.
East is bound for states after early exits from districts the past two years, all while negotiating the rugged road of qualifying through playbacks.
“It’s awesome taking it this far after two years of not getting past the first round,” Platt said.
“We do really good under pressure during games like this. It’s really exciting for all of us,” Steigerwald said.
There was definitely pressure, especially against a Spring-Ford team that beat Downingtown East 5-1 on Oct. 1. But the pressure was alleviated by Steigerwald on a classy one-touch redirection of Olivia Lawton’s low cross in the 9th minute. Five minutes later Lawton played the finisher with a rising shot from the right side, East scoring more on Spring-Ford in the first 15 minutes than they couldmuster through all 80 the first time around.
A dream start you could say.
“Yeah! Oh, my gosh, yeah,” Steigerwald said. “The first 15 minutes we came out there and pushed each other and got two goals really fast. It was awe- some.”
“We wanted to do everything we could to get the lead and wanted to do that early and we were pressing to do that,” East coach Craig Reed said. “To have Emma, who has been fantastic all year, score and then Olivia Lawton comes through with that second goal. Those are two special players with two brilliant