The women's soccer team of Seattle Pacific University might have seemed overmatched against an unbeaten and higher-ranked University of Western Florida team that featured fast, physical players with international experience. But in the end, it was disciplined team play and a solidly executed game plan that won the day for the Falcons 1-0, in double overtime, Sunday at Pepin Stadium in Tampa Bay, Fla.
"The third time was the charm," exulted Falcon coach Chuck Sekyra. It was SPU's third trip to the Division II Final Four in the past four years. Sekyra had maintained all along that the team that wanted it most would win it, and that's how it went. When rain began to fall before the first overtime, Sekyra told his team, "Seattle rain - it's a sign."
SPU dominated control of the ball in the first frame, but were outshot by the Argonauts. At the scoreless halftime, after the Falcons had been unable to convert, the commentator on CBS College Sports TV opined that circumstances now favored the Argos with their fast offense.
But throughout the evenly played match, SPU's veteran defense - seniors Katie Taylor, Claire Grubbs, and Alex Butler, and sophomore Becca Woods and freshman Savanna Hanson - held in check the explosive Argos, a team full of recruits from Brazil, Jamaica and Trinidad.
The trailing wind did little to help the Argos in the second half, as the Falcons kept to their ball control game and outshot the locals by an 8-2 margin. When regulation play ended, rain began to pour.
The first 10-minute overtime ended still scoreless, but the greater energy was coming from the SPU side.
With a little over two minutes remaining in the second OT it seemed clear that the visitors from the Northwest wanted it more.
The winning score came in typical bang-bang-bang-fashion as defender Alex Butler lofted a long ball from the right side into the 18-yard box. The ball tipped off the head of Jocelyn Charette, the team's assist leader, and landed at the feet of diminutive midfielder Janae Godoy at the left of the goal. She instinctively fired it across the goal mouth, past three Argos defenders, and into the right corner of the net.
"I didn't see it go in," Godoy said. "I knew it was in."
Godoy was hoisted to her thrilled teammates' shoulders, but as she said in a postgame interview, "I love every girl on this team. This is for them and all of our alumni." It was her fifth game-winning goal in the last seven games.
For SPU, every day there's a different hero. Senior midfielders Meredith Teague and Shannon Oakes have led the team all year and scored crucial goals.
On Thursday's semi-final match against Metro State of Denver, it was sophomore Amanda Johnson with two goals and an assist, and Charette with a goal and an assist herself.
Charette distributed the game-winning assist in each of the last four victories, including Thursday's 3-1 semifinal win over No. 12 Metro State, a 1-0 quarterfinal victory over No. 22 Truman State and a 1-0 double-overtime, third round decision against No. 12 Western Washington.
Sophomore Maddie Dickinson earned the shutout for the Falcons. All year long she and junior keeper Jesslyn Rahm have been stingy in the net, allowing well under a half-goal per game.
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