No. 30 Fossil Ridge High School’s boys soccer team fell short of grabbing the first ever state title for Fossil on Wednesday, November 9 when they suffered a devastating 1-3 loss against No. 2 Boulder High School. The loss kicked the Sabercats out of the tournament but the team still made history, making it further than any other Fossil Ridge boys soccer teams.
Going into the game, the Sabercats knew that they would have to compete because Boulder was a very strong team both defensively and offensively. At training leading up to the big semifinal game, they worked on the new formation that they would play as well as how to compensate for the two players that would be missing on the field; Jaime Chavarria and Taylor Trujillo.
The whistle blew signaling the start to the second semifinal game of the night at Legacy Stadium. Both teams started out with physical play, demonstrating it was going to be a tough and close game. The Sabercats’ strategy was to play the ball over the top of Boulder’s defense and hope that Blair Durand’s speed would be enough to earn them points. However, Boulder’s defense was prepared and continually double and triple teamed Durand.
The competition was intense, each team creating dangerous opportunities but the score remained tied 0-0.
With 1:44 left in the first half, Boulder scored the first goal of the night to put them in the lead 0-1. The score stayed at 0-1 with Fossil Ridge trailing Boulder going into halftime.
The second half began and the Sabercats were still in it. 3 minutes into the second half, Grant Martinez got taken down in the box, resulting in a penalty kick for Fossil Ridge. Martinez stepped up to take the PK against the No. 1 keeper in state. The keeper taunted Martinez has they waited for the refs to set up. Martinez missed the PK after the keeper guessed the correct way, keeping the score at 0-1 and still in favor of Boulder.
15 minutes later, Fossil Ridge was given a corner. Martinez took the kick, finding Cameron Viola on the cross who headered it into the back of the net and tying the game 1-1.
With 13:28 left in the game, Boulder scores their second goal and took the lead once again. 6 minutes following their goal, they struck again and scored their final goal of the night. The Sabercats were down 1-3 with 7:28 left in the game.
Once the score was 1-3, the Sabercats knew that the last couple minutes were the last minutes of the high school season so they kept pushing ahead, not giving up. They created multiple dangerous opportunities but were unable to execute any of them.
The end of the game was signaled and Fossil Ridge dropped their heads in disappointment, knowing they were out of the state tournament. Even though they didn’t make it to the championship, they still made history. This year is the first year ever that a Fossil Ridge boys soccer team has made it to the semifinals for state.
“We set the standard this year. We showed that it doesn’t matter what seed you are, anything can happen. I couldn’t be more happy of our performance, not only tonight but this whole tournament. They showed up to play when I called on them the most and I couldn’t be more proud of them.” Zach Speed.