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Crestview’s season slips away

COLUMBIANA–With the situation looking dire the Crestview girls soccer team nearly pulled off a season-saving rally in Monday’s Division III sectional. Unfortunately for the Rebels, 10th-seeded Valley Christian snatched the game away in heartbreaking fashion.

Valley Christian senior Logan Schnabl scored the go-ahead goal with 45 seconds remaining to propel the 10th-seeded Eagles to a 3-2 victory over both the seventh-seeded Rebels and the rapidly approaching darkness at Crestview High School.

“This is our first tournament win in a long, long time. Longer than I can remember,” Valley Christian coach Harry Brockway said. “I couldn’t be blessed with a better group of kids. They kept fighting no matter what the situation, I’m so proud of them.”

Valley Christian improves to 5-12 overall and advances to play at second-seeded United at 7 p.m. Thursday. The Rebels close their season at 3-10-4.

“Tonight didn’t go the way we wanted, but our girls played tough the whole time,” Crestview coach Alexis Jayne said. “Their pride never went away.”

A communication snafu led to the game being played under unusual circumstances. The Rebels were all warmed up and ready to go by 3:45 p.m. for the scheduled 4 p.m. start, Valley Christian still had yet to arrive however.

When the original bracket came out, the game was listed as a 7 p.m. start. That quickly had to be changed to 4 p.m. because Crestview’s soccer field does not have lights. Brockway said the school never received an e-mail notifying them of the change.

The Eagles had to scramble to get a bus and did not arrive until 4:41 p.m. After warmups, the game began at 5:11 p.m.

“We never got an updated bracket from the tournament director,” Brockway said. “I was apologizing left and right when I got down here. Luckily, both the referees and Crestview were very kind.”

The Rebels tried their best to stay loose in the chilly conditions during the long wait, but the situation was obviously far from ideal.

“I would say it probably affected us a little bit, because we already warmed up and then we had to sit around for an hour,” Crestview senior Jillian Beard said. “But that’s not the reason we lost.”

“We might have been a little cold, but overall I didn’t notice our energy go down,” Jayne said.

When the action finally begin, everyone knew that there would just barely be enough daylight for a regulation match and that any tie would result in the Eagles returning to Crestview sometime before Thursday to finish things up.

Any potential contingency plan would have been complicated by the fact that the Crestview is hosting at boys soccer match at 4:30 p.m. today against Wellsville.

Thanks to the effort of Schnabl, though, it was all a moot point.

In addition to her match-winner, Schnabl got the Eagles off and running with a goal in the very first minute of play.

After a first half in which the Rebels got a handful of good looks but could not break through, the Eagles made it 2-0 five minutes into the second half when Sadie Vogt found the back of the net.

“I think we could have gotten to the ball a little better,” Jayne said. “We lost a lot of 50/50 balls on punts and goal kicks. We needed to execute those situations a little better.”

Crestview refused to fade quietly. Morgan Cresanto landed the Rebels’ first goal off an assist from Kassity Miller with 29:32 left.

With it getting darker by the minute, Miller touched off a Crestview celebration when she tied the match off an assist from longtime teammate Jillian Beard with 8:50 left.

“We just put our heads down and got to work,” Miller said. “Nobody wanted the season to end. Getting that goal was an exhilarating feeling.”

A regulation finish appeared very unlikely at that point, but Schnabl had other plans. When she connected with 45 seconds left it was getting hard to see the numbers on the backs of the jerseys.

“The momentum was with them, but these girls never give up,” Brockway said. “We’ve had games these season where we’ve gotten our heads handed to us, but they kept playing until the very last whistle. They come together when they need to.”

As the Rebels reflected on the bittersweet ending to a difficult season, they chose to remember the positive moments together.

Miller wound up setting both the school single-season and career records for goals this year, while Beard did the same with assists. Keeper Donna Finch (who had 17 saves Monday) also set single season and career records for saves.

“I’m going to remember everything, from the games and practices to hanging out with each other outside of games,” Miller said. “Hopefully we continue to stay close.”

“We all had a terrific bond together,” Beard said. “Especially me and Kassity, we’ve been playing together forever and we’ve always been best friends.”

Match Notes

¯Jayne–who had been an assistant all season–was serving her first game as head coach. She was thrust into the position last week after Crestview decided to move on from head coach Tim Malone. Crestview athletic director Laura Nappi said that the administration felt a change was needed and declined to comment any further.

“Getting thrown into this position at the last minute was a little earth-shattering, but we did the best we could with the situation,” Jayne said. “This is the hardest-working group of girls you will ever come across and I’m proud to have gone through the season with them. They stuck it out and played a hard game tonight.”

¯Miller closes her career with 74 goals and finished with 28 this season. Beard finishes with 66 career assists and 21 on the season. She is also second in school history behind Miller with 65 career goals. Finch finishes with 567 career saves and 207 for the season.

¯Schnabl is also a kicker on the Valley Christian football team. She has 35 of the team’s 41 goals this season.

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