5A boys soccer: Grandview battles to program’s first state championship

COLORADO SPRINGS – For the Grandview Wolves boys soccer program, the fourth time was the charm.

After runner-up finishes in 2004, 2007, and 2018, the team captured the fall 2021 5A boys soccer championship Saturday afternoon at Weidner Field, with a 3-1 victory over Fossil Ridge.

“Grandview has been here a few times and it’s always been close but never quite there,” longtime head coach Brian Wood said. “I could just feel it with this group, once we got going, we just kept going and got better every day.”

The Wolves were in a comfortable position throughout the match, as they had a 2-0 lead at the half. In the first stanza, off a set piece well outside the box, a ping-ponging ball found the foot of senior Luke Williams to make it a 1-0 game exactly 10 minutes into the game.

After that the two teams settled in without many offensive opportunities on either end, until the 35th minute of the first half, when a wildly spinning loose ball was knocked towards the net by senior Charlie Lucero, and it sneaked by the Fossil Ridge keeper and into the twine to make it a 2-0 lead into the half.

The goal for Lucero came on his 18th birthday.

“Words can’t explain how happy I am right now. We worked so hard this entire season and it’s just finally paid off,” Lucero exclaimed. “It was such a great feeling to score that goal, especially on my birthday.”

In the second half, the score remained where it was until just under nine minutes to play. Fossil Ridge broke Grandview’s three-game shutout streak after Quinlan Ybarra chipped the ball in towards the net, and Will Boyle hammered it home to make it 2-1 late in the contest.

The celebration for the Sabercats was short lived, though, as just two minutes later, Dylan Thompson rocketed in a goal to put Grandview back up 3-1.

The adversity was something the team was used to facing all season, as the Wolves started the season just 4-4. But following that loss to Highlands Ranch on Sept. 14, the Wolves did not lose another game the rest of the season.

“These guys work so hard, they don’t get down they just come back,” Wood explained. “Every time we’ve had something bad happen they just rebound. We’ve had times where we could have just folded, but they just battled back everytime.”

“After starting 4-4 we said, this is the breaking point,” Lucero added. “We have to treat every game like it’s a playoff game or we might not even make it to the playoff. From that point on we said we believe in ourselves, and we did it.”

For Fossil Ridge, the runner-up finish caps off a 13-7 season and an incredible run in the postseason as the No. 17 seed. The Sabercats won each game of their playoff run in overtime.