The crowd at Tiger Stadium probably saw a solid 75% of the girls’ soccer match between Centralia and W.F. West on Tuesday — everything in the first half and everything on the half of the pitch closest to the stands in the second, when a dense fog hid just about everything that happened on the far sideline.
Everyone who stayed after the final whistle, though, could see the Bearcats lifting up the Chronicle Cup after a 1-0 win, winning the two-match competition 1-0 after neither team scored in the first rivalry matchup of the fall.
Reese Mishler’s goal in the 36th minute turned out to be the only goal scored in the entire 170 minutes of the rivalry series — two full 80-minute matches, plus the 10 minutes of extra time played before the first match’s shootout — and was enough to keep the girls’ Chronicle Cup in Chehalis.
But for W.F. West, retaining the trophy was a secondary part of the evening as the regular season races toward its conclusion and the postseason looms.
“Our goal as a team coming into the season, we wanted to finish top-two in the league, and we needed to win today to do that,” first-year W.F. West coach Kevin Schultz said. “Other than that, trophies are cool and all, and it’s cool for the players, but the main importance is that we needed to win this one. We’re trying to go 1-0 each game right now.”
Tuesday, the Bearcats (7-7, 6-4 2A EvCo) went 1-0, though this one game in particular played out in a way that few had ever experienced.
“I couldn’t even see what was going on the other side of the field,” Centralia coach Luis Magana Reyna said.
As the first half came to a close, an evening that had started bright and clear was invaded by wisps of fog. By the start of halftime a bank began to roll in, and by the beginning of the second half, it had settled completely on Tiger Stadium, completely concealing the benches from the viewpoint of the stands — and the stands’ side of the field from the coaches.
“You can’t really coach a lot, so you say the things you’d normally say, just hoping that the players are getting in the position they’re supposed to be in,” Schultz said.
The fog did its best to slow the match down in the way that neither team could.
W.F. West took the opening kickoff and nearly scored within the first 100 seconds, having a shot saved off the post by a diving Braylee Blankenship. That kicked off a hectic half hour, with the Bearcats and Tigers (8-5, 6-4 2A EvCo) racing up and down the field to trade chances.
“I think neither teams’ midfields were tracking back very well, so as soon as we lost the ball, they were already behind our midfields and able to go forwards,” Schultz said. “And then as soon as they lost the ball, we were already behind their midfield and we were able to go forward. There wasn’t a lot of just possessing the ball
“It’s not necessarily the prettiest game of soccer, but it makes it very exciting.”
W.F. West got the only goal it would end up needing in the 36th minute, immediately following a substitution on the Centralia back line. Taking advantage of a bit of miscommunication, Emily Mallonee worked the ball down the left sideline before crossing it into Mishler, who buried it in the far corner.
“She was kind of the hero again today,” Schultz said of Mishler. “It’s one of those cool things for us, because we have so many players we feel could start for us. She doesn’t get as many minutes as maybe she could in other teams in the league, but she was ready for the moment when it came, which was awesome.”
The goal avoided the scenario Centralia and W.F. West found themselves in the 2022 boys’ Chronicle Cup, when two ties led to one last, decisive shootout for the trophy.
Elsewise, Blankenship stopped every shot the Bearcats sent her way. Opposite her, W.F. West’s Staysha Fluetsch made five saves for her second straight Chronicle Cup shutout.
In the final 10 minutes, the Bearcats subbed in extra defensive bodies and invited pressure, but Centralia wasn’t able to break through, with its best chance coming on a cross into the a free Tiger in the box in stoppage time but only resulting in a weak shot off a knee that Fluetsch saved easily.
“I’m not upset with the performance, because the girls did work hard and they had their opportunities,” Magana Reyna said. “It just came down to them taking advantage of theirs and us not taking advantage of ours.”
Both the Bearcats and Tigers, now tied for third in the EvCo standings a half game behind Aberdeen, have two league games left. W.F. West will face Black Hills on Thursday, be off next Tuesday, and then wrap up the regular season at home against Rochester. Centralia is set to fill its bye from EvCo play with a non-league match against Ilwaco on Thursday, then play Black Hills and Aberdeen next week.
