2A Girls Soccer | Archbishop Murphy falls short
LAKEWOOD - Archbishop Murphy will not win back-to-back state championships in Class 2A girls soccer this season.
Fife scored three second-half goals to beat the defending-champion Wildcats 3-0 in the state semifinals at Harry Lang Stadium on Friday.
The Trojans (18-1) will play for their first championship at 4 p.m. today against Burlington-Edison (19-3), a 1-0 shootout winner over West Valley of Spokane in the other semifinal.
“They figured if we’re here now, we might as well finish the job and get it done,” Fife coach Teri Shimoda said of her players.
Senior forward/midfielder Haley Shaw put Fife ahead 1-0 in the 42nd minute. Eleven minutes later, Karissa Haelle scored on a breakaway for a 2-0 lead.
“Once we got behind, especially that second goal, even though we kept battling I thought the realization started to set in that we were going to lose,” said Wildcats coach Dick Henderson. “But, as they say, we lost to a good team.”
Archbishop Murphy, a Catholic school near Mill Creek, canceled classes Friday and bused hundreds of fans to the game. Fans rallied around the soccer team after the school’s unbeaten football team was knocked out of the playoffs by the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association last Friday. Archbishop Murphy was forced to forfeit eight football games when it self-reported that a football player’s physical had expired a few days before the Sept. 12 death of coach Terry Ennis.
The Wildcats (21-1) will play West Valley of Spokane at 10 a.m. today for third place. Archbishop Murphy has placed in the top three at state every year since 2001.
“Good athletes finish strong in everything they do,” said Henderson. “So tomorrow we’re going to try to finish strong and go out on a little better note than we did today.”
Other semifinal
Burlington-Edison 1,
West Valley (Spokane) 0, shootout
The Tigers (19-3) outscored the Eagles (16-5) in a shootout, 4-3, with Sarah Berentson scoring the decisive goal. Burlington-Edison, which lost to Archbishop Murphy in the quarterfinals last year, reached the championship game for the first time.