COMMERCE CITY – For the last seven seasons, the Dawson girls soccer team has played in the 2A girls soccer championship game.
And for the third time in the last four years, the Mustangs are state champions.
With a 3-0 victory over Crested Butte, Dawson claimed the 2022 Class 2A girls soccer title Wednesday evening, May 25, at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park. It marks back-to-back titles for the program.
It wasn’t the easiest road to the championship this time for the Mustangs, as they started the year just 2-3-1, one of the wins coming via forfeit, dropping them from preseason No. 1 in the coach’s poll, all the way down to No. 8.
“It was a bit of a rough start to the season,” first year Dawson head coach John Welsch said. “We had low numbers all season long, and every time we’d show up to a game we’d say, ‘okay who’s here today.’ But these girls just started meshing and peaking at the right time. Every game they just started getting better and better. It’s not always pretty, but they are determined, and they fight for each other. It’s been a fun journey.”
Peaking at the right time involved the team winning seven of their last nine, including a perfect 6-0 in league play, to enter the playoffs as the No. 5 seed. From there, they battled through three hard fought playoff games, eventually taking out No. 1 seed Denver Christian in the semis.
That led to the title game, where the Mustangs seemed to control the game from start to finish, scoring one goal in the first six minutes, and adding two in the second half to coast to the victory. It also marked the seventh clean sheet for the defense on the season.
Dawson didn’t waste much time breaking the ice, as Madison Shaw got free down the left side, and curled one in to open the scoring in the sixth minute. It was her 30th goal on the season.
“It’s always nice to start one nothing ahead than one nothing behind,” Welsch stated. “I thought Crested Butte was a great team, they were fit they kept the pressure on us. In a lot of games this season, we start early and the build on that lead, and today we weren’t able to build on that lead until late in the second half.”
Both sides settled in from there, as Dawson got a few shots on net, while Crested Butte tallied a shot and three corners, but neither side could find twine to keep it 1-0 into the half.
The Titans came out firing in the second half, getting a couple corners and a great look on net, but Dawson was able to hold on to keep the 1-0 score. With just under 15 minutes to play, a foul on a potential scoring opportunity led to a PK, and Ella Stewart converted it to put Dawson up by two. It was her third goal of the season.
Down the stretch Dawson’s leading scorer Kanoe Bihag added the dagger, scoring on a nice shot in the upper right corner to put the game away at the 3:44 mark. It was her 35th goal of the season.
“Once we got that second and then the third, it was kind of like ‘whew now we can breathe a little bit,’” Welsch added. “Credit to Crested Butte, they worked hard they put us under pressure. Some of our players were exhausted at the end there, we really had to dig deep to get the win today.”
For the Titans, they finished the season with a 12-6 mark, including making their first ever appearance as a program in the girls soccer state title game.