Quick strike holds up for Racine Prairie

There was no slow start for Racine Prairie this time.

Luis Garduno scored just 2 minutes, 9 seconds into the game, and that goal held up the rest of the way as the Hawks downed Sturgeon Bay, 1-0, in the Division 4 championship game at the WIAA boys state tournament at Uihlein Soccer Park on Saturday.

Racine Prairie needed nearly 36 minutes before finally finding the net in an eventual 5-1 semifinal victory on Friday. But in this one, the Hawks got out front quickly and then had to rely on their defense to carry them the rest of the way.

"It’s definitely a blessing and a curse at the same time," said coach Corey Oakland of jumping out to such an early lead.

"We maybe got a little too hyped up, and they didn’t seem to be flustered by that goal at all. I think we kind of even lost a little bit of what we wanted to focus on - just keeping the ball and moving it around."

Forcing the action early, the Hawks (17-4-3) got their quick-strike score when Koda Fletcher fed Garduno just inside the box. Garduno punched his shot in from the left side and about 10 yards out.

"(Scoring so early) feels amazing and really scary at the same time, because you never know what’s going to happen through the game," Garduno said.

Racine Prairie managed just eight more shots the rest of the way but was able to hold on thanks to some terrific defense of its own.

Perhaps the biggest play came in the 41st minute, when defender Nicholas Dybul helped keeper Will Sullivan by clearing a ball off the goal line with an almost point-blank chest block.

"It’s a cliché that defense wins championships, but we knew that this game today was going to be decided by defense," said Oakland, whose team allowed just two goals in six postseason games, one of which was an own goal in Friday's semifinal.

"It didn’t mean that we weren’t going to go out and try to score – we were still trying to get after the game for sure – but that was just a sign of respect for what they have been doing and also what I know we can do defensively."

The title was the sixth overall for Racine Prairie, second in Division 4 and first since 2014.