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Overcast South Side wins state championship
Tops Somers, 1-0, on Ford's goal in fourth OT
Fate works in mysterious ways.
Less than a minute after replacing an injured Christina Klaum in the fourth overtime of last Sunday’s New York State Class A girls’ soccer championship game, Katie Ford delivered the title-winning goal for
South Side.
Ford, a sophomore, headed in a long free kick from freshman Tessa Considine to beat Somers, 1-0, with 1:01 remaining at Homer High School near Cortland. Ford out-raced Somers goalkeeper Beth Coppolecchia to a bouncing ball and sent it rolling into the net from about 15 yards out.
“It was rolling in slow motion,” Lady Cyclones coach Shannon McEntee said of the goal. “When it crossed the line, everyone just flooded the field to celebrate. It was an incredible way to cap the season.”
McEntee said she didn’t hesitate to call on Ford after Klaum was forced to the sideline with just under two minutes to play after a tangle with a defender left her with a cut lip. “Katie makes things happen whenever she’s on the field,” McEntee said. “When I saw Christina had to come out, I didn’t think twice about who to put in.”
Roughly 30 seconds after re-entering the game, Ford scored the biggest goal of her life. “I was standing side-on and watched the ball all the way from when Tessa hit it,” Ford said. “I saw the keeper break and I knew the only way to beat her to it was to use my head. One of their defenders almost kept it out, but the ball crawled in.”
Had Ford’s header been stopped and there was no scoring in the final 61 seconds, the teams would have finished in a tie and been declared co-champions. A penalty kick tiebreaker isn’t used in the title game.
“I’ve never experienced anything like this and I still can’t believe it,” said Klaum, a sophomore who had the magic touch throughout the playoffs, with 11 goals in seven games, including the lone tally in South Side’s Long Island Class A championship win over Islip. “It’s great to be state champs after last year didn’t go as planned,” she added. The Lady Cyclones had their 13-year county title run end in 2010 with a loss in the final to Garden City.
