Sacred Heart is back where the Crusaders believe they belong every season, playing for a state championship.
The Crusaders got a first-half goal and made it stand up until getting a clinching goal in second-half stoppage time for a 2-0 victory over St. Stanislaus Tuesday night in the MHSAA Class I Boys Soccer South State finals at Klein Field.
Sacred Heart (13-3) advances to the Class I (3A/2A/1A) State Championship Game 2 p.m. Saturday at Ridgeland High School against St. Andrew’s, which defeated Amory 6-2 in the North State finals.
It will be the Crusaders eighth trip to the state finals, but the first since they won back-to-back championships in 2019 and 2020. They have four state titles to their credit. The Rockachaws, the defending state champs, finished their season 10-7-1.
“Back a few years ago, when we went (to the state finals), my brother was on that team,” said Crusader senior forward Ashton Ware. “We felt like we had prove something to ourselves that we could get this team back to the state finals.”
It was Ware who got the Crusaders on the scoreboard midway through the first half.
Both teams got off to a tentative start, with little happening in the game’s first five minutes. But the Crusaders stepped up the pace, getting long balls and long runs to put pressure on the St. Stanislaus goal.
The two Region 8-I rivals had played two previously this season, both 3-0 wins for Sacred Heart, so there weren’t many secrets. Still Crusader head coach Romar Smith built a game plan around early pressure on the goal.
“The boys continued to dig in and give it their all throughout the game, and the result shows,” Sacred Heart head coach Romar Smith said. “Everybody came up big for us tonight.
“We watched a lot of videos over the last couple of days, once we knew who we were playing. We’d had some success with pressure before. We felt like the back end was their weakest point and we made an effort to attack that.”
The pressure paid off in the 16th minute of play, when senior sweeper Zach Rhynehardt made an open run down the right sideline and found 8th-grade midfielder Elliott Boyette wide-open in front of the net, with St. Stanislaus senior goalkeeper Finn Williford out of position.
Boyette whiffed on the shot, but got enough of the ball to flick it over to Ware coming from the left. Ware sent the shot over the diving Williford and into the upper right corner of the net.
“Everyone knows I’m the fast guy on the (left) wing,” Ware said. “I’m always attacking. I made my run in like I always do, and Zach just knows how to cross it back. He put right under Elliott’s foot right to me.
“I felt kind of bad for Elliott, but he got the assist and that was probably what he was aiming for anyway.”
Sacred Heart kept the heat on, and freshman forward Julian Blaylock got his first good opportunity just two minutes after the score, getting a shot on goal that Williford was able to knock away.
“We knew it was going to be a tough game,” Blaylock said. “Me and Ashton, we connect pretty well in the front, dribbling past players and moving the ball. I thought we played a great game tonight with the chances we created.”
Sacred Heart had an 11-6 advantage in shots in the first half, with the Crusaders getting six on goal, while the Rockachaws had just two on frame.
St. Stanislaus came out for the second half with renewed energy and a commitment to take the fight to the Crusaders.
“Obviously, they put a lot of pressure on us in the first half,” St. Stanislaus coach Zach Villarrubia said. “That wasn’t our intention. Our game plan was to be on the front foot a little bit more.
“So, at halftime, we just talked about refocusing on the ball and to press forward a little more. We were getting our good chances. A couple of shots that were cleared off the goal line, the keeper made some nice stops, and then they nicked us late when we were pressing forward.”
The Rockachaws earned a corner kick just two minutes into the period that resulted in a lot of activity in front of Sacred Heart senior keeper Mic Galaher, but no shot.
Two minutes later, St. Stanislaus sophomore forward Cole Shirley got an open look at the goal, but pushed the shot wide left.
“We expected it,” Galaher said. “St. Stanislaus is a really strong team, and we expected them to come out and fight in the second half. We just had to fight through it.”
The Crusaders thought they had a second goal in the 51st minute in a wild sequence in front of the net. Ware was set up perfectly just five yards from the goal, receiving a pass from Rhynehardt, but Williford made the save.
With all sorts of traffic surrounding him, Williford dropped the ball, and Blaylock pushed it into the net. However, the goal was disallowed because of goalkeeper interference.
Given new life, the Rockachaws pushed forward with their best push of the game, a five-minute period in which they got five shots, two on-goal, and three corner kicks.
Junior Richard Niolet had St. Stanislaus’ best scoring chance of the game in the 60th minute. He scooped up a rare misplayed pass in the back and got a wide-open shot from 15 yards out left side that Galaher had to dive to the ground to knock away.
“We had a really good first half; second half we got a little sloppy,” Galaher said. “We gave up some opportunities and committed some fouls we shouldn’t have, but we made it happen.”
Blaylock got the Crusaders back on track with two good runs for decent shots that just missed the mark, but resulted in a pair of corners and helped ease the pressure on their defensive end.
As the second half moved into what would be six minutes of stoppage time, the Rockachaws desperately pushed players forward to get a tying goal, which left them vulnerable to counterattack.
And Blaylock obliged for Sacred Heart, intercepting a crossing pass at midfield and dashing unmarked for a breakaway and an easy game-clinching goal in the first minute of stoppage time.
“I was just telling myself, ‘I’ve got to drive.’” Blaylock said. “So I used my pace to stay on and I was clinical in the finish.”
For the game, Sacred Heart finished with 18 shots, 10 on-goal and seven corner kicks. St. Stanislaus had 15 shots, six on-goal and six corners.
St. Andrew’s will be making its fifth straight trip to the state finals, including a state title in 2021.
However, the Saints and the Crusaders met five times in the playoffs between 2013 and 2020 and Sacred Heart won all five, including the state finals in 2019 and 2020.
“This feels very good, very, very good,” Galaher said. “We’re excited about it.”
