Perrysburg girls soccer team wins Division I state title

Perrysburg goalie Chloe Buehler (1), center, celebrates with teammates and fans after defeating Mason during the Girls Division I State Championship Soccer game at Columbus Crew Stadium in Columbus. Perrysburg won 1-0. THE BLADE/JEREMY WADSWORTH Enlarge | Buy This Photo

COLUMBUS — Mak­ing his­tory should never be easy, and the un­stop­pa­ble Per­rys­burg girls soc­cer team was fi­nally chal­lenged be­fore the Yel­low Jack­ets per­se­vered to post an un­prece­dented feat.

Per­rys­burg be­came the first girls pro­gram from north­west Ohio to win a state soc­cer ti­tle with a tense 1-0 vic­tory over Ma­son in a Divi­sion I cham­pi­on­ship game on Fri­day night. The Yel­low Jack­ets cap­tured the school’s first state ti­tle in any sport since 1991 with a tight vic­tory in the con­test at Co­lum­bus Crew Sta­dium.

Gifted se­nior for­ward Maddy “The Ma­gi­cian” Wil­liams scored the only goal. Wil­liams scored near the mid­point of the first half on a pen­alty kick. She fin­ished her se­nior sea­son with an as­ton­ish­ing 48 goals and scored in ev­ery game but one.

Se­nior net­minder Chloe “The Goalie” Buehler was phe­nom­e­nal through­out the con­test. Buehler made sev­eral div­ing and leap­ing saves. She fin­ished with nine saves and faced 25 shots over­all.

PHOTO GALLERY

• Perrysburg vs. Mason

• Yellow Jackets state-bound

HACKENBERG COLUMN: Chloe 'The Goalie' a rock for the Jackets

“I had to come up big a few times, and we’re state champs,” said a beam­ing Buehler af­ter the game with a medal around her neck. “There is no bet­ter feel­ing. I ig­nored ev­ery­thing around me. The ul­ti­mate goal was not to have the ball in the net, and we ac­com­plished that.”

Wil­liams scored with 15:25 left in the first half on the free kick. Wil­liams, who will play next sea­son at Pur­due Univer­sity, set up the first goal with re­lent­less­ness as she bat­tled a Comet de­fender one on one to draw the pen­alty shot. She then made no mis­take from 12 yards out to send the large Perr­syburg con­tin­gent into a frenzy.

“I just want to go hug ev­ery­one I’m in such a good mood,” Wil­liams said. “This is like liv­ing a dream. I love this group of girls so much. They are like my fam­ily.”

Per­rys­burg (23-0-0) was ranked No. 1 all year and trailed just once all sea­son. The Yel­low Jack­ets out­scored their foes 108-5. But un­ranked Ma­son, which fin­ished with a 9-5 edge in shots, proved to be the big­gest ob­sta­cle as it con­stantly pres­sured and kept the ball in the Per­rys­burg end.

“We knew it was go­ing to be a nail-biter,” Yel­low Jack­ets co-head coach Jorge Diaz said. “It was an awe­some game to watch and coach. I’m very emo­tional right now be­cause we re­ally worked very hard, and we had this goal from day one. It’s amaz­ing it came true.”

Destiny seemed to be on Per­rys­burg’s side as the Comets hit two posts and one cross­bar.

Buehler, who will play at Penn State, jumped to make a save and then dove for an­other dur­ing a 40-sec­ond span late in the game to main­tain the slim lead. Buehler then snatched the ball out of mid­air to pre­vent a goal with 3:35 left.

“Chloe is ab­so­lutely our MVP,” co-head coach Mar­ga­ret Ber­nard said. “She re­ally is an awe­some goalie. She re­ally stepped up and made some big saves to­day.”

Per­rys­burg trailed just once this sea­son, 1-0, to Gahanna Lin­coln on Sept. 8 be­fore ral­ly­ing for a 4-2 win. Buehler, who missed 10 games with a back in­jury be­fore re­turn­ing full time for the last 11 games, yielded only two goals all sea­son and never trailed.

Buehler came out to beat a free Comet for­ward to a loose ball to keep the one-goal lead late in the first half. Buehler then made the save of the half when she got a hand on a point-blank shot by Madi­son Mel­nick, who had two great shots in the game.

“This is the clos­est game we’ve ever had,” Wil­liams said. “We’ve never won by just one goal be­fore. Chloe is amaz­ing. She is my hero. She should get MVP. They came out fight­ing, but we came out on top.”

Per­rys­burg was only the sec­ond team from north­west Ohio to reach the girls ti­tle game. St. Ur­sula made it last year.

Ma­son, a sub­ur­ban school from the Cin­cin­nati area, also was play­ing in its first state ti­tle game. The Comets con­trolled play and had 26 shots to­ward the net over­all.

“It’s crush­ing,” Ma­son coach Andy Schur said. “But give Per­rys­burg credit, their keeper is a re­ally im­pres­sive player. She was the star of the match. We had the bet­ter of the chances this eve­ning, but it was Per­rys­burg’s night.”

Diaz said when he woke up yes­ter­day morn­ing his yard was com­pletely filled with soc­cer balls.

“The way the com­mu­nity and par­ents have come to­gether this way is amaz­ing,” he said. “I’m so blessed to coach this team.”

Wil­liams had Per­rys­burg’s first qual­ity chance of the match as she set up her own shot, but Ma­son goalie Toni Baz­za­roo (four saves) made a div­ing save. Buehler made the best save of the sec­ond half when she come out to stop a solo break­away by Mel­nick early on. Wil­liams then had three straight qual­ity chances for Per­rys­burg late in the game. Ma­son coun­tered when Mel­nick’s shot de­flected off the cross­bar with 16:59.

Per­rys­burg’s 23-game win­ning streak is fourth lon­gest in Ohio his­tory. The Yel­low Jack­ets also had cap­tured state ti­tles in 1991 (soft­ball) and 1979 (vol­ley­ball).

“This is the fur­thest you can go,” Wil­liams said. “We won it all. It’s so awe­some I can’t even de­scribe it. This is the best way to go out.”

Con­tact Mark Mon­roe at:mmon­roe@the­blade.com,419-724-6354 or onTwit­ter @Mon­roeBlade.