With a state trip at stake, The Overlake School boys’ soccer team gave it their all, but came up short.
The pivotal winner-to-state, loser-out 1A Emerald City League Championship game was the fourth meeting between the Cedar Park Christian Eagles of Bothell and the Overlake Owls this season.
In the three previous meetings, Overlake had beaten the Eagles by one goal each time, 4-3, 2-1 and finally 1-0 back on Oct. 8. But Cedar Park turned the tables on the hard-luck Owls as the Eagles scored an early 6th-minute goal off the foot of junior midfielder Steven Dressler to claim a 1-0 playoff victory.
“That kid had a real nice shot,” said Overlake coach Bob Bristol on Dressler’s long 35-yard score that was just out of the reach of Owl goalkeeper J.J. Cardenas. “Not much we can do about that. They have a real good goalie, and we put all the pressure on and did everything we could to get a goal, but it just didn’t happen tonight.”
MISSED OPPORTUNTIES
While the Owls, according to Bristol, “didn’t play a great first half,” the final 40 minutes were a different story.
Overlake, with their backs to the wall, dominated time of possession and took eight shots in the second half, with a few near-misses that ended up just wide. Eagles’ goalkeeper Kevin House, who notched his league-leading seventh shutout of the season, made four saves to keep the Owls at bay.
“It looked like we lived in their end of the field, but we just couldn’t find the goal,” Bristol lamented. “For the most part we shut them down (in the) second half.”
The 2010 Owls, by comparison to last year’s state runner-up squad that also went undefeated through the regular season, are a young team.
Especially when compared to the senior-laden Eagles, who clinched their first trip to the 1A state tournament.
“We’ve had so many close games with these guys, they’re a great team – Bob (Bristol) runs a great organization, but we just had to believe in ourselves,” said Cedar Park head coach Ken Kerr, who described Dressler’s goal as “phenomenal”. “We thought we were there but didn’t believe it. It was such a tight game, we executed our game plan the first 10 minutes… poked one in, then went back and played defense.”
And with a number of experienced upperclassmen on Cedar Park’s squad, one of the few starting non-seniors was more than happy to come through for his teammates.
“My coach and assistant coach told me when I got in to be aggressive and put pressure on the defense,” Dressler said. “But it was the heart of our guys. I think we wanted it more, we have 15 seniors on this team and they deserve this. I was just trying to help.”
A STINGING LOSS
After a dejected Overlake bench watched a raucous celebration by the Eagles, Bristol acknowledged that, even in defeat, the program is headed in the right direction.
“It’s very disappointing… but that’s the nature of a 1-0 game,” Bristol said. “As I told our kids, I think right now Overlake soccer is the measure for everybody, and we’re going to get everyone’s best shot. For us, not winning and not going to state is (disappointing), but that’s the nice thing about our program. That’s what kids feel like now, and I want to be associated with that.”
Bristol also noted that the loss was especially hard to swallow for his team’s seniors, many of whom have been playing together since middle school.
Also hurting the Owls’ chances was the fact that Overlake, by virtue of being the No. 1 seed, had to sit for what seemed like an eternity, while Cedar Park is fresh off two hotly-contested postseason contests against Bellevue Christian and Bush School.
“What really hurt us is that we had basically three weeks between our last game, and (Cedar Park) is fresh off a playoff game,” Bristol explained. “Our league didn’t help us with this weird schedule, so we’ll see what happens next year.”
The Eagles (12-4-0 overall) will advance to the 1A state tournament next spring while Overlake finished with a 14-1-1 record.
