GIRLS DIVISION II

CHAMPIONSHIP
Saturday, February 9
3 Catalina Foothills 3, 4 Apollo 0

Charlie Kendrick has guided another team to a state championship. That’s seven titles since 2005 and the fourth in a row since 2010.

Catalina Foothills Championship Teams
2003: 4A (Christie Monroe)
2005: 4A (Charlie Kendrick)
2006: 4A-I (Charlie Kendrick)
2007: 4A-I (Charlie Kendrick)
2010: 4A-I (Charlie Kendrick)
2011: 4A-I (Charlie Kendrick)
2012: D-II (Charlie Kendrick)
2013: D-II (Charlie Kendrick)

It’s an incredible run that has now placed Kendrick two wins over the next coach in the history of girl’s soccer in Arizona. And, with forward Emily Parker only being a sophomore, there are sure to be more trophies to bring back to Southern Arizona.

Parker entered the final against Glendale Apollo tied with her teammate, junior Aleah Strength, with 19 goals on the season. Strength, if you recall, scored the winning goal against Notre Dame Prep in the semifinals held Wednesday.

Parker pulled ahead of Strength with her 20th goal for the Falcons in the 26th minute off a corner kick that was hand-touched by an Apollo defender to prevent in from going in but Parker reacted quickly and body placed the ball into the corner of the goal.

There would have been a PK and, likely, a red card on the play regardless had the referee saw the handball.

Junior forward Aminah Settles scored her 18th goal of the season on a header in the 53rd minute to put Catalina Foothills up 2-0 and then Parker scored again in the 62nd minute for her 21st goal.

In her two games against Apollo this year, Parker has scored four goals as Catalina Foothills far outpaced Apollo 9-0 in the two matches.

While the top eight scorers for the Falcons will be returning next year, six seniors have been through four state championships. No one will ever be able to earn more.

Senior defender Maddie Parker (Emily’s sister) is headed to New Mexico, senior Morgan Rooney is playing for Concordia Oregon and senior keeper Laura DeMers will be joining Parker at New Mexico. The other seniors include Amanda Hyatt, Emily Tedards and Arlene Lanz.

Soccer has to be the only sport where luck and circumstances can win a game or get you to a championship final. Apollo has two losses this year and both of them came against Catalina Foothills but the team from Glendale had one of the easiest regular season schedules with a negative opponent rating (-1.7). One would have to wonder how many losses they would have had they played a schedule like Sahuaro (4.2), Foothills (6.9), Ironwood Ridge (9.2), and Sabino (6.3)?

True, Apollo beat Sabino in the first round but Sabino was seeded 13 and Apollo was the 4 seed. On top of that, Sabino was missing several key players including Shannon Shields and Willow Cozzens. And, finally, Apollo barely won 7-6 on PKs…at home.

Then, Apollo beat the 5 seed Arcadia in the second round 1-0. Sounds like a good win? Hardly. Arcadia’s opponent rating was an even more dismal negative 4.2.

On the other side, the top seeded Sahuaro squad was upset by 8 seed Sahuarita on PKs in the quarterfinals which set up an easier match for Apollo in the semifinals but, even then, they only squeaked out a 2-0 victory to set up their rematch against Catalina Foothills in the championship.

Foothills was also helped a bit when 2 seed Flagstaff was upset by 10 seed Notre Dame Prep in overtime in the quarterfinals and then Foothills scored a controversial goal against Notre Dame in the final moments to win the semifinal. Notre Dame felt Strength had collided with the goalie but she was rewarded for her aggressive play.

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 9th, 2013 at 1:52 pm and is filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.