Cardinal Gibbons can’t keep pace with Bolles in Class 2A soccer final
Ten years after making their only appearance in a state championship game, the Cardinal Gibbons girls’ soccer team was hoping for a better fate than 2009 when they lost in overtime penalty kicks to Ponte Vedra.
But unfortunately for head coach Margo Flack, it was more championship game disappointment again as the Chiefs dropped a 5-1 decision to defending champion Jacksonville Bolles in the Class 2A state championship game at Spec Martin Stadium despite taking an early lead in the first half.
For Bolles, it was the team’s eighth overall state championship but fourth in the past five years and second in a row.
As it turned out, the Chiefs’ defense turned out to be no match for Bolles’ remarkably talented front line of Avery Patterson, Izzy Kimberly and Olivia Candelino, a trio committed to North Carolina, Southern Cal and Auburn, respectively.
The three combined for Bolles’ first four goals (Patterson scoring twice) as the Bulldogs (19-3-2) broke loose from a 1-1 halftime tied with three goals in the first 10 minutes of the second half to pretty much end the issue.
“We knew coming into this game those three players were going to be very difficult to control,” said Flack. “I thought we did a pretty good job of it in the first half but I guess you can only hold that kind of talent in check for so long.”
When senior forward Maya Alicea broke free down the middle thanks to a rare Bolles defensive mistake, she found herself one-on-one with Bulldog keeper Claire Cywes and easily beat her when Cywes overcommitted for a Chiefs goal and 1-0 lead 10 minutes into the game.
“I just saw they had a bad touch and I just executed on it,” said Alicea of her goal. “Their left back had a bad touch and I just took a touch forward and I was 1-on-1 with the keeper and it was just a matter of getting her to commit one way and going the other.”
Even though Bolles and that talented front line of Patterson, Kimberly and Candelino controlled the remainder of the first half, the Chiefs were just six minutes away from taking the lead to the halftime locker room, perhaps giving Flack a chance to set up some defense and protect the lead.
But when Teagan Duenkel got called for a foul inside the box with 6:15 left, the Bulldogs got a penalty kick and Patterson easily rocketed a shot past Gibbons keeper Alexis DeVeaux.
Clearly with the momentum, Bolles came out and basically slam-dunked the game when Candelino scored five minutes into the second half followed by goals from Kimberly and Patterson just 90 seconds apart. It was 4-1 with 30:25 left in the game and the look on the Chiefs’ sideline, shoulders slumped, said it all.
If it hadn’t been for DeVeaux, the score might’ve been much worse as she made more than a dozen saves, a half dozen of them filed into the “big-time” category.
“Those three, (Patterson, Kimberly and Candelino) they’re just so fast,” said Alicea. “They just get past you, not just us, they can get past any team and it made it incredibly tough on us. But I’m proud of my teammates, we fought every single game, especially coming back to win that Carrollton game (Gibbons trailed 2-0 with 25 minutes left in the regional final and came back to win 3-2) or we would’ve never even been here tonight.”
Said Flack: “Once they took the lead, everything kind of fell apart quickly. But no matter how rough it was tonight, I told the girls I was very proud of them and nothing was going to take away what we did this season. You never apologize for being one of the last two teams standing, especially when it was such a tough path to get here.”