EVERETT — The Snohomish Panthers will get their chance to defend their state titles.
The two-time defending 4A state boys soccer champions booked their place in the state tournament by defeating the Cascade Bruins 2-1 Saturday afternoon at Goddard Stadium, claiming District 1’s second and final state berth.
“It feels good,” Snohomish coach Dan Pingrey said about advancing to state for the fifth straight season and the 17th time in the past 18 years. “That’s our expectation every year. It’s nice to be able to get there. We just took the hard path. I’m happy for the guys, they’ve been wanting it. We can never seem to make it easy for ourselves, we had a great first half and then we kind of boggled up a few things. But I’m happy for them, they’ve done well.”
There was legitimate danger that Snohomish would miss out on state for just the second time since 1998. The Panthers were beaten during the district tournament for the first time in five years when they dropped Thursday’s district championship game to Mariner 3-1, putting their season on the line in Saturday’s winner-to-state, loser-out contest.
But Jason Fairhurst’s two goals in two minutes midway through the second half put the Panthers in pole position, then Snohomish held on late after Juan Heredia’s second-half goal got Cascade back in it.
“The whole year we talked about defending the third state championship,” said Fairhurst, whose team is seeking to become the first to three-peat in the large-school division since Mountain View claimed titles from 1991-93. “That would be history in the making right there.
“I think it’s great [getting back to state],” Fairhurst added. “I don’t like the way we’re getting into state this time, going through the back door. But why not? It’s just a little more work.”
Snohomish (14-1-4), the district’s top seed, will travel to take on the District 4 (southwest Washington) champion in the first round of the state tournament early next week.
Cascade, the district’s fourth seed, finished its season 9-10-1.
“Overall I think we played one of our better games,” Cascade coach Sam Croft said. “We probably could have come out a little harder in the first half.
“We fought back really well in the second half, got a goal, rallied — that’s pretty much been our season against Snohomish,” Croft continued. “We’ve been very competitive with Snohomish all year.”
Snohomish was the superior team in the first half, and the Panthers nearly took the lead in the 17th minute when Eric Jones’ free kick took a deflection off traffic and bounced off the post.
But it wasn’t long before the Panthers had the ball in the net. In the 22nd minute Snohomish broke on a quick counter attack. Brennan Judy crossed from the right, and an onrushing Fairhurst headed it in to give the Panthers a 1-0 lead.
Snohomish’s second goal came even quicker. Just two minutes later the Panthers played the ball short from corner kick on the left quickly, getting the ball to Fairhurst at the outer-left edge of the penalty box. Fairhurst sent a low drive goalward that glanced off a defender and skipped past wrong-footed Cascade goalkeeper Scott Pease at the near post, making it 2-0.
“He’s been on a little bit of a drought, so that’s great for him to get two goals within the run of play,” Pingrey said of Fairhurst. “We’ve talked about that, our forwards have been on a drought other than Brennan. So it was nice to see him get some goals, get in the mix.”
Snohomish had a golden opportunity to kill the game off 14 minutes into the second half when good footwork by Noah Rasmussen earned the Panthers a penalty kick. However Fairhurst, handed the opportunity for his hat trick, put the PK wide.
Cascade nearly made the Panthers pay for the miss. The Bruins got on the scoreboard seven minutes later as Jordan Watson’s free-kick cross from the left was headed by the Snohomish defense onto its own crossbar, and Heredia followed up to nod the ball in and make it 2-1.
The Bruins, buoyed by the goal, continued to press, with Spencer Bowlden sending in a series of dangerous long throw-ins into the Snohomish box. However, the Panthers showed off their strength in the air by dealing with them all, and now they’re marching on to state.
“I think after Thursday’s game we did a lot of self-reflection and kind of looked back at how we did,” Fairhurst said. “Coming out this game it was a whole new team. We changed a couple things and it worked perfectly. Couldn’t have asked for a better turnout.”
At Goddard Stadium
Goals—Jason Fairhurst (S) 2; Juan Heredia (C). Records—Cascade 9-10-1 overall. Snohomish 14-1-4.
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