Lady Hilltoppers make semifinal match look easy

Los Alamos cruises past Aztec to set up title tilt with Albuquerque Academy

BERNALILLO — The opportunities provided by the annual high school state soccer tournament aren’t nearly as random or unique as they might seem.

At least, not at the level played by the Los Alamos girls.

Since the Lady Hilltoppers were tossed into the alphabet soup that is the New Mexico Activities Association’s classification system, which separates the big schools from the small, the level now known as Class 5A has basically been a private school playground with everyone else waiting to take a turn.

Seventeen of the last 18 state champions in 5A — and before that, 4A and 1A-3A — have been either Albuquerque Academy or St. Pius. The lone exception was Los Alamos in 2003. In fact, only four schools (Academy, Pius, Los Alamos and Aztec) have ever even reached the finals since the NMAA split its classifications into big and small schools in 1998.

That means that the only public school to win a title during the lifetime of every player in the tournament was Los Alamos 14 years ago.

“I wasn’t even aware of that fact until just now,” said Lady Hilltoppers head coach Ann Cernicek, moments after her club beat Aztec, 4-1, in Friday morning’s 5A semifinals to reach Saturday’s title game against — not surprisingly — Academy.

The top-seeded and defending champion Lady Chargers (18-4) made quick work of No. 4 Farmington, 3-1, in the other semifinal.

Sixth-seeded Los Alamos (17-5-1) becomes the lowest seed to reach a 5A championship match since No. 6

Academy did so three years ago.

The ‘Toppers got there thanks to two goals by Alissia Haagenstad and one apiece from Katie Hopkins and Anna Rose Matuszak. Hopkins broke the scoreless tie early in the first half and then the first of Haagenstad’s goals made it 2-0 at halftime.

Aztec made things interesting when Kaylee Madewell scored in the 50th minute to cut the Los Alamos margin in half, but Haagenstad’s second goal provided some cushion and then Matuszak’s proved to be the soul-crusher for the Tigers.

The Lady Hilltoppers have now scored 17 goals in three matches in the tournament, the most of any team in the field. They’ve scored seven times in two matches this week.

“The offense is making good passes, we’re getting good spacing and we’re taking good shots,” Haagenstad said. “I’m not sure if this is the best we’ve played all year, but the competition is a lot better, so it feels amazing to do what we have been.”

Friday’s game was never really in doubt. Although Aztec did make a push after spotting Los Alamos a two-goal lead, the Lady Hilltoppers remained on the offensive for the first 70 minutes. It wasn’t until Matuszak’s goal that they sent reinforcements to the defensive end to avoid any semblance of a collapse.

Cernicek said her team will have to do to Academy what it has done to every opponent in the tournament, and that’s finish the scoring opportunities when they present themselves.

“We’ve had chances against them this year but never seemed to take advantage of it,” she said. “They’re such a good team that anything they give you, you have to do something and so far we haven’t. Not against them, anyway.”

Academy swept the regular season series from Los Alamos, winning 3-1 and 3-0 en route to the District 2-5A title.

The emotional boost of making it to the finals after receiving what appeared to be a lower seed than they deserved has given the Lady Hilltoppers a new mission in the postseason. The team is focused and playing a more aggressive brand of soccer.

To keep the momentum, Cernicek said the plan was to spend Friday night together at the team hotel and deviate as little from the norm as possible. No superstitions, she said. No impromptu team bonding sessions.

“We’d planned to be here this long so, really, it’s just a thing where we will try to keep it as normal as we can,” she said.

“I think a lot of us are handling it pretty much like normal, but me — I know I’m not going to sleep,” Haagenstad said. “I haven’t slept well all week so maybe it is kind of normal, I don’t know. All I can say is we’re ready to go out and make some history, maybe be the next team from Los Alamos to win one of these things.”

NOTES

Looking on: Sitting about 50 feet behind the Los Alamos bench on Friday was former Lady Hilltoppers coach Jiri Kubicek. He led the program to its 2003 state title and got it back to the finals in 2006, 2008, 2009 and 2010. They lost all four times, including three straight to Academy from ‘08-10.

He was 2-7 in his career in the state finals, going 2-5 against Academy.

All told, Los Alamos has reached the championship game 16 times, going 4-10-2 dating to the first NMAA tournament in 1981.