For a half, it looked like the Adna girls soccer team was already running on empty. By the end of the match, it became apparent that the Pirates were just saving some gas for one extra sprint at the end.
After going into halftime chasing a two-goal deficit to Onalaska in the semifinals of the 2B District 4 tournament, Adna found its spark, coming back to tie the game up in stoppage time, before completing the comeback with a golden goal by Bailey Naillon four minutes into extra time to win 3-2.
“I am proud of the fight these girls have,” Adna coach Patrick Richardson said. “I wish I could see it more often. But maybe now that they know what it feels like, they will feed off it. I know we have played well at times during the season but I still think we have so much more to give, and maybe this is the spark.”
The Pirates had their share of possession early, but couldn’t do much of anything with it, and the Loggers finally drew first blood in the 23rd minute when Jaycee Talley cleaned up a rebound. Fifteen minutes later, Onalaska sprung Brooklyn Sandridge on a one-on-one, and she put it home to double the lead and put a foot into the district finals.
“We came in at half and talked about how the second half is a whole new ballgame and we had plenty of time to score,” Richardson said.
It didn’t take long for the Pirates to do just that, with Karlee VonMoos drilling a shot from long range past the keeper to cut the lead in half.
And as the half went on, the tide began to turn.
“We kept pressuring and you could see a little wear-down on the faces of some of the Onalaska players,” Richardson said. “We luckily still had some more in the tank.”
It took a bit for the Pirates’ pressure to pay off, as the tension built in Kalama. But in the 78th minute, VonMoos broke through again, scoring to tie the game just before stoppage time began.
From there, momentum could only be delayed by the brief intermission after regulation, and Naillon put a quick end to things in the 84th minute, beating multiple defenders and slotting a low shot home for the win.
The victory for the Pirates sets up a rematch of last year’s district title game with Kalama, which downed Napavine 7-0 in the second semifinal of the night. Last season, the Chinooks downed Adna 3-1 at Tiger Stadium in Centralia; this time around the two sides will meet on the Black Top at Tenino, on Saturday.
Onalaska, meanwhile, will drop to the third-place game, where it will match up against Napavine in a loser-out, winner-to-state date.
