Heritage girls continue middle school soccer dynasty
Heritage boys finish as tournament runners-up after penalty kick shootout decides final
Another year, another collection of championship trophies for the juggernaut that is the Heritage Middle School girls’ soccer program.
For the 12th consecutive year, the Navy-and-red claimed the NGAC tournament championship and did so with another unbeaten season, capping it with a 4-0 victory over county rival Lakeview in last Monday’s final at Ridgeland.
Head coach Mike Craft said the team was able to pick things up after a bit of a slow start to the season.
“The year started off a little rough because of the weather,” he explained. “We were only able to practice in the gym for a while and it hurt us starting out. But once we could finally get outside on the field and see what we needed to work on, we were able to correct our problems and we just got better and better. Getting past the bad weather really made a difference.”
Heritage produced all the offense it would need in the first 10 minutes of Monday’s match. Mady Terry sent a ball through to Lila Langston, who knocked home the initial goal in the fourth minute. Just four minutes later, Allie Boyd lifted a shot that Molly Cason was able to head into the net as the Lady Generals increased their lead to 2-0.
The final two goals would come in the second half. Briley Simpson scored unassisted in the 40th minute, while tournament Most Valuable Player Brooke Fairchild dished out one final assist on a goal by Terry in the 50th minute.
Keepers Lauren Mock and Emily Holcomb both had one save in the combined shutout, while Cason, Simpson, Natalie Butler, Lindsay Davies, Emilie Freeman and Lily Langston aided the cause on defense.
The victory also gave Heritage (11-0) a sixth consecutive unbeaten and untied season.
“We just keep trying to build the team from year to year,” Craft said. “I never load up with a whole team full of eighth graders. I always try to get some younger players, build them for the next year and get them trained and into the system of how we want them to do things. Most of the time, they get used to playing together, so it’s not like starting off with a brand new team (each year) because they’re already used to working together and playing in the system.”
Heritage and Lakeview also met last year in the girls’ final at Ringgold High with Heritage pulling out a narrow 2-0 win.
The Heritage boys took the field shortly thereafter looking to make it a sweep, but third-seeded Trion knocked off the top-seeded Generals in a thrilling championship final that needed a penaltykick shootout to decide the winner.
Trion scored the only goal of the first half in the 16th minute as Jose Mateo got a step on a defender and pushed home a goal to give the Bulldogs a 1-0 lead. Trion would keep the pressure on in the second half, but was not able to add to its lead as the Heritage defense and goalkeeper Evan Wamsley stood firm.
After nearly tying things up following a wild scramble for a loose ball in front of the Bulldogs’ goal with six minutes remaining in the match, Heritage would finally get the equalizer less than a minute later as Chipper Grayson converted a picture-perfect free kick past the Trion keeper from approximately 18 yards out.
Both squads had scoring chances late in the first fiveminute overtime session and both teams were unable to score on golden opportunities in the first 90 seconds of the second overtime period. Heritage would get one final good look near the end of the second extra session, but missed high, while Wamsley came up big with a late stop to send the game to the shootout.
Trion made a switch at keeper, going with Andy Ramirez to begin the shootout. After both teams converted their first kicks, the move would pay off as Ramirez made a save on Heritage’s second penalty kick attempt.
Both teams converted in the third round of the shootout, but the Generals would miss their fourth attempt. Wamsley kept his team alive with a big save in the fourth round and Heritage would score on its final kick to tie the shootout, 3-3. However, the Bulldogs still had one shot to go and put their championship hopes on the foot of Mateo as he set up for the final kick.
Wamsley correctly guessed where Mateo was aiming and dove to his right in a valiant attempt to make the save and extend the shootout. But Mateo’s shot was just able to get past the diving attempt, sending the Bulldogs running onto the field in celebration of their first-ever NGAC tournament championship in just their fourth year as a program.