Saturday’s championship final of the Riverview Gardens girls soccer tournament ended in the strangest of places.
Due to severe weather in the area, the game was stopped with 28 minutes left in the second half and both the teams from St. Charles and Zumwalt North, game officials and all fans in attendance were ushered into a basement weight training and wrestling room at the school.
After more than one half hour of waiting, St. Charles was declared the winner based on the 3-2 lead the Pirates held when the game was stopped.
“This is pretty weird,” said Pirates’ striker Erika Teson. “I never have gotten a trophy like this (as the game officially ended with the teams hunkered down in Riverview’s wrestling and weight rooms). I’ve had something like this happen on my select team before but never with this team.”
Before Mother Nature managed to rule the day, though, both teams put on quite the offensive show.
St. Charles (9-7) took the 1-0 lead just eight minutes into the game when Teson broke down the left side of the Zumwalt North penalty area and uncorked a shot.
The volley clanged off the left post, rolled straight across the goalmouth and tucked inside of the right post for the goal. It took the game officials a few extra seconds to rule on what happened but eventually they called the shot a goal.
“I knew it was in,” Teson said. “It hit that close post and then went over to the other side. I knew it was a goal the whole time.”
Four minutes later, Zumwalt North (4-9) was on the offensive attack.
That attack culminated in the Panthers getting a goal from Merissa Martin as she collected the rebound of an Amanda Wiechens shot that pinged the crossbar and chipped it into the gaping net.
Less than a minute later, though, St. Charles struck back as Autumn Olendorff rushed down the right side of the Zumwalt North penalty area and ripped a shot back inside the left post past Panthers’ goalkeeper Tori Ballman into the net for the 2-1 Pirates’ lead.
“Marissa Freise passed it to me and the keeper came out and I tapped it by her,” Olendorff said. “I had a girl on my back and the keeper went to slide (for the ball) and I just shot it and hoped for the best. It was good because the team needed to get back into the lead. It was just a big lift for all of us.”
St. Charles added to its lead with just over three minutes left in the first half.
On the play that made the score 3-1, Teson had a breakaway and she managed to put the shot past Ballman. Teson said that he was just as happy with the team’s play after the goal until the stoppage as she was with the play that led to the goal.
“I think we really played good after that,” Teson said. “We picked it up.”
Teson’s coach agreed with the team’s high quality of play, not just after the third goal but during the entire game.
The win marked the Pirates’ sixth in a row and it is the second tournament title this season after the Pirates captured the O’Fallon Christian Tournament earlier this month.
“We’re playing solid soccer right now and it’s a team effort,” St. Charles coach Rodney Orrick said. “We’re getting strong defense, good possession in the midfield, the keeper’s doing a great job and our strikers are creating a lot of opportunities. It’s just a well-rounded game the girls are playing right now.”
The game’s final goal came at with about four minutes left before the weather stoppage.
The Panthers’ Emily Beins sent the corner into the penalty area where Nikki Steiner got the ball and chipped a shot toward the Pirates’ goal.
From there, Wiechens got a head on the ball and sent a shot over St. Charles’ keeper Emily Wilson and into the net for the 3-2 score.
“I think we played well, I just think I would have liked to have seen the (final) 28 minutes play out,” Zumwalt North coach Eric Delabar said. “Like I told the girls, it’s a hard way to lose in the weight room, but that’s the way it is. I’m happy for the way we played. I am not happy for the way we didn’t step up and play that way from the beginning.”
Wilson earned the win while Ballman suffered the loss.
In other games of the Riverview tourney: Natalie Weinhold had four goals and an assist to lead Lutheran St. Charles to a 5-2 win over visiting Lutheran North (4-7) Saturday at Riverview Gardens. She was credited with the game winning goal. Jamie Skerston also contributed for Lutheran SC with a goal and an assist. Courtney Sansone was credited with the victory in goal for Lutheran SC (4-10).
Anissa Gomez had a hat trick to lead McCluer (4-10) to a 7-0 win over Riverview Gardens (1-12) Saturday at Riverview Gardens. She was credited with the game winning goal. Also contributing for McCluer were Kaandra Eddings (two goals), Kelly Kennealy (one goal, two assists) and Chantel Hill (one goal). McCluer keeper Alexis Armstead stopped the only shot she faced to pick up the win.
