EXETER – Morgan Hawkes and Brooke Shatney trotted off Eustis Field to a loud ovation with 3:21 remaining. They each took turns hugging the coaching staff and gave a few teammates some high-fives before taking a seat on the bench.
Their jobs were done for the day.
The John Stark Regional High School girls’ soccer team duo had done enough damage for the afternoon. Hawkes and Shatney combined for three goals in the game and helped set the third-seeded Generals up with a two-goal lead in the first 11 minutes en route to a 4-0 shutout of No. 5 Oyster River in the Division II championship game at Bill Ball Stadium on Sunday.
“I think this is the first championship that the women’s soccer team has ever won at John Stark and it means so much to our school,” said Stark Coach Heather Doucette after the Generals capped off a 17-3 campaign with a title in hand. “We got a lot of support from our fans and the school itself, which is awesome for the girls. They worked so hard this season.”
Doucette wasn’t wrong. The Generals made history on Sunday, avenging a 2-1 loss to Hanover in the 2014 championship game to claim the program’s first ever state title.
“It’s incredible,” Shatney said. “Especially because it’s my senior year, it couldn’t be more memorable. We’ve worked so hard for this.”
With nerves at an all-time high for the Generals in a contest that figured to be a low-scoring affair between a pair of Division II’s stingiest defenses, Shatney and Hawkes allowed Stark to breathe a sigh of relief early on.
Taking advantage of an Oyster River turnover not even three minutes into the opening half, Hawkes centered herself with the goal and ripped one into the right corner of the net before many fans had even found their seats. Eight minutes later, Shatney carried the ball into the left corner, took a chance on a shot from a tough angle and watched as the ball one-hopped its way past Bobcats goalie Susan McDonough and into the net for the 2-0 advantage.
“I think everyone, including the upperclassmen, coming into the game were definitely nervous and that’s to be expected. But I think stealing two goals in the first couple of minutes definitely helped us calm down a little bit,” Shatney said.
Doucette added: “It was huge because one of the things is we are young. We have six seniors but we have a lot of younger players for us who are starting or getting some very solid minutes and for us to get a couple of goals, it gave our team a lot of confidence.”
From there, Stark let its impressive back line preserve the lead in the first half. Jocelyn Dimond and Meghan Blanchette were instrumental in limiting Oyster River to just two first-half shots and zero corners.
Defense like that made a 2-0 lead feel insurmountable, and it got worse for the Bobcats when Stark’s Aria Ulmer was in the right place at the right time with under two minutes to go before the half, volleying home a rebound chance after the ball deflected off McDonough’s hands and bounced around off a few players.
“Our defense is definitely what holds us together,” Shatney said. “They work incredibly hard at practice at everything we do and they hold our team together.”
Senior Sarah Clark, who rotates in for the Generals on the back line, said there isn’t one thing that makes the unit so strong, it’s just the will to compete.
“We all have the heart and will to do it and get what needs to be done, done,” Clark said. “It’s a great way to end my senior career and it’s a great win for coach. I know (Doucette) wanted it bad and it was just exciting and a good win for everyone.”
Oyster River would find some open space on the field to work in the second half, nearly tripling its first-half shot total, but still never managed to make a dent in the lead. A chance at a late-game comeback was slim down by three, but Hawkes made it impossible when she scored her second goal in the 63rd minute, staying with her first-shot miss and beating a defender to the ball in the box to pocket her own rebound.
“We talk about being a family. We talk about working together, the ‘we instead of me’ thing and they showed it today,” Doucette said. “We came out and our game plan was to put a lot of pressure on them because I know they are a great team … I think we took them out of their game and that was our game plan.”
(Jay McAree can be reached at 369-3340, jmcaree@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @JayMcAree.)