SAN JOSE—“It was a battle,” Gilroy coach Adam Gemar said to an emotional Mustangs team following its semifinal match with Archbishop Mitty. “I wish we could’ve gone a couple more days.”
The Mustangs played their hearts out for all 60 minutes of Wednesday’s Cental Coast Sectional semifinal game against the Monarchs, but unfortunately its season ended there. Mitty handed the Mustangs a heartbreaking 2-1 loss, scoring in the final minutes to advance to the championship. The Mustangs finish the season 15-3-2 with Mitty being the only team to beat them this season, accounting for all three of their losses.
“Every one of our team members wanted it so badly and it was so apparent because finally everyone wanted it. It showed in the first half, we had them completely,” senior Katrina Carter said. “It was just disappointing because after that first goal there was a little miscommunication and little mistakes here and there that kind of got us.”
Gilroy dominated possession in the first half and displayed stellar discipline. It drew six corners to Mitty’s one, but was unable to poke the ball through for a score. Neither team could penetrate the other’s defense and the half ended in a scoreless tie.
Senior Morgan Rogers was on fire, attacking the Monarchs net with four shots on goal in the first half. Her tenacity finally paid off in the 38th minute when she blasted a shot to the opposite side of the net to give her team a 1-0 lead.
“I was looking and it was in the net,” Rogers said. “I’ve never felt so happy. It was just incredible.”
Mitty put on the pressure after Gilroy’s goal and drew back-to-back-to-back corners. The Mustangs held tough with exceptional defense from sophomore Emily Boykin as well as senior goalie Jackie Jauregui.
Not everything, however, was in Gilroy’s favor. Questionable calls made it difficult for the Mustangs to maintain their momentum and landed a key player, senior Tayler Silacci, on the sidelines after she was given a yellow card.
All Silacci could do was watch as the Monarchs relentless attacked the Gilroy net on corners and as her team tried to fend them off while down a player. Mitty finally broke through in the 44th minute and Morgan Peterson made it a 1-1 game.
“It was hard watching my team go out there,” an emotional Silacci said after the game. “When they got all those corners, I was on the sideline because of the card. It was hard because that’s when they scored.”
“Honestly, I think we played more as a team this game and we won. In our hearts we won and even on paper (we did, too),” Jauregui added. “I think we wanted it more than they did and they just got lucky.”
Ellie Sausen and Boykin helped fend off the onslaught of Mitty’s attack for the remainder of the game and it looked as if overtime would be needed to determine a winner. The Monarchs had other plans, however, as Jamie Nordin netted the game winner with just 1:07 left on the clock. Gilroy had a chance to tie it up in the last 40 seconds, but just couldn’t push it through.
“The first half was an awesome half. I still think we’re a better team,” Gemar said. “We won the first half, they won the second—sometimes that’s how it goes. No matter how it works out, you’ve still got to play all 60 minutes.”
Though their high school careers are over, Silacci and Carter were still thankful for their stellar season. When they reflected on the first day of practice, they both said it was hard to believe how far the Mustangs have come.
“I know Tayler and I were like ‘oh my god. We’re not even going to make it playoffs this year’, but Adam is a really amazing coach,” Carter said. “He honestly makes it so enjoyable for us that we want to learn more, especially because he runs with us. We work as hard as we do because Adam does it all with us. All our sprints, all our fitness Adam is right there next to us doing it.”
“The amazing thing is we think that every year (we’re not going to make CCS) and every year we end up here,” Silacci added. “He doesn’t leave any excuse to not be trying because he’s out there doing it.”
Mitty moves on to face Los Gatos in the CCS Championship game at 11 a.m. Saturday at Leland High School. The realization that Gilroy’s season was over was still hard to grasp for Gemar after the game, especially since he was certain his team would be the one playing for the title.
“I didn’t just want to play Los Gatos, I wanted to beat Los Gatos,” he said. “I really thought we were going to win—it wasn’t just a chance thing. It was like all right, they beat us twice. We’re going to beat them this time—piece of cake. The circumstances just weren’t in our favor.”
