GEORGETOWN – Boerne High’s 2023 girls soccer season ended pretty much like last year’s did – with a trip to the 4A state tournament to face Celina in the state semifinals.
Last year, Celina beat BHS 3-0, and on Wednesday of this week in Georgetown, the Lady Bobcats were able to knock the Lady Greyhounds out of the playoffs for the second consecutive season, this time by the score of 2-0.
Boerne finishes the season at 26-3 and will graduate a large group of seniors from the team – a dozen of them.
Greyhounds coach Jeremy Shannon said the seniors have left a great legacy by qualifying for the state tournament two years in a row.
“It’s been four years with these girls and just to have the pleasure to coach them and see them mature throughout the years, it’s a huge deal,” Shannon said as he became emotional talking about them. “It’s been a great four years and I’m so proud of them but now it’s time for the juniors and sophomores and fresh- men to step up and continue that legacy.”
One of the seniors, Kylie Combs, said they’ve wanted to get to state since they started high school.
“Since our freshman year our goal has been state and we’ve been talking about it and working towards it every day in practice,” she said. “This is proof that our hard work paid off.”
Even though Celina has eliminated Boerne from the playoffs the last two season, this year’s contest seemed more evenly matched than in 2022 even though there was only a one goal difference in the scores (3-0 vs 2-0).
On Wednesday, it was scoreless for the first 14 minutes before the Bobcats struck for its only goal of the first half. Around that time, the Lady Hounds had a good look at a goal but couldn’t convert and Celina held a 1-0 lead at halftime.
“We had our chances, obviously we didn’t capitalize on them. That’s taking nothing away from Celina, they’re a dang good team, we just couldn’t get the ball settled,” Shannon said. “We had one quality shot that I thought was going to go in and if we had tied it or gone up 1-0 it might have put them more on the defensive and maybe get them nervous and force them into more mistakes, but it didn’t work out that way.”
Boerne was only listed as having one official shot in the match, which occurred in the first half, while Celina finished with 16 shots in the match. One of the 9 shots the Bobcats took in the second half found the back of the net after Mia Norman converted a free kick from 50 yards out that gave Celina the 2-0 lead in the 56th minute, which held until the end.
Wednesday’s shutout by Celina was its 20th of the year and at one point during the season the Bobcats registered 14 straight shutouts. Wednesday’s match also marked the first time the Lady Hounds were kept off the board in 2023.
The Bobcats went on to win the state championship match on Thursday against Stephenville, 8-1, to wrap up a perfect season at 29-0 and with consecutive state titles.
Shannon said their loss on Wednesday wasn’t from a lack of effort and added that his team did all it could.
“Our group played their hearts out and it made us proud,” he said. “I really do think this was the No. 1 and No. 2 team in the state, unfortunately we got matched up together, but it’s been a great year, you can’t take that away from us.”
Seniors this year are Hannah Bowen, Kaelin Daniel, Regan Mroz, Madison Davis, Kylie Combs, Lily Griffith, Yaya Arroniz, Kassie Lozano, Kate Spiekerman, Annika Fairchild, Madeline Davis and Melissa Garza.
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