Liberty girls win state soccer championship
Liberty spent most of the two-hour, 15 minute weather delay at Saturday’s Class 4 girls soccer state title game annoying opponent Nerinx Hall.
Apparently, one of the Blue Jays’ favorite rain-delay theater pastimes is singing just about anything that comes to mind — including Mary had a Little Lamb and the Star Spangled Banner — at full volume. Nerinx Hall apparently heard enough at some point and shut the door to its locker room.
After Liberty got done singing, it did more than enough to commence celebrating as it claimed the third girls soccer state title in school history with a 3-1 victory at Swope Soccer Village.
The Blue Jays (23-2) took home a state title for the first time since winning in both 2010 and 2011.
And as it turned out, the lengthy weather delay was nothing compared to the final 20 minutes of the match after Nerinx Hall (18-4-2) cut Liberty’s two-goal lead in half.
“That final 20 minutes was definitely the longest wait of my life,” Liberty sophomore forward Maya Gaona said. “It was the most fun, most scary, like most exciting time of my life. It was really enjoyable.”
Liberty didn’t have to wait until the final whistle. Junior Madilyn Hamline got the party started two minutes early when she emphatically scored the final goal of the season to put the Blue Jays up by the final 3-1 score.
The 18 minutes before that, however, were white-knuckle time.
“We could’ve stayed in the locker room all day. I told the girls we can only control the things we can control,” Liberty coach Tyler Nash said. “We can’t control the weather, but we can control the outcome.”
There wasn’t much action to speak of at all in the first half until Gaona put home a cross from Hamline with 45 seconds remaining. The two teams were set to start the second half before officials suspended it with storms approaching.
Gaona struck again eight minutes into the second half, setting the tone.
“I told them, ‘You’re going to have 10 minutes where they’re going to throw everything at you, and you can catch them sleeping.’ I think they did,” Nash said.
The Marker defense was unlocked when Shae Turner put Gaona alone in front of the goal with a nifty feed. Gaona didn’t panic and calmly converted the opportunity.
“We were definitely looking to make that happen. We’re always looking to connect, from our centers to our forwards, and try to get something through whenever possible,” Gaona said.
The future is bright for Liberty, which returns a number of contributors from this team for the next two years.
“From day one, we knew this is what we wanted to do. We have a goal board, and this was our No. 1 goal for the season. We just achieved that, and it was really great,” Gaona said.
The Blue Jays also learned important lessons about the importance of friends and family after the program dealt with a recent tragedy.
“We’ve learned that soccer isn’t bigger than what it is. My brother, actually before the district game, committed suicide,” Nash said. “They’ve gone through the trials and tribulations with me. They’ve embraced my family. It’s something they can never forget, no matter what we do. I think it’s one of those things where we showed them our soccer family can come together, and it’s huge. I’ve never found a group that loves themselves more than this group. They love being around each other.”
Lee’s Summit West, Kearney win third-place games: Lee’s Summit West and Kearney each took third place in their respective classes on Saturday.
LS West shut out Francis Howell Central 2-0 in Class 4, and Kearney blew past Union 4-1 in Class 3.